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THE   SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 


j0m. 


MACMILLAK  AND   CO.,  Limited 

LONDON  •  BOMBAY  •  CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNB 

THE  MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

NEW  YORK   •  BOSTON  ■  CHICAGO 
ATLANTA   •  SAN   FRANCISCO 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.   OF  CANADA.  Ltd, 

TORONTO 


EAST  LONDON  F'A^r-  FOR  THE  JEWS. 


LendinJ  and  Reference  Library. 


THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

EDITED  WITH 

AN  INTEODUCTION  AND  A  COMMENTAEY 

BY 

C.  G.   MONTEFIORE 

TOGETHER   WITH   A  SERIES   OP 

ADDITIONAL  NOTES 

BY 

I.   ABRAHAMS 


IN  THREE  VOLUMES 
VOL.  I 


MACMILLAN  AND   CO.,   LIMITED  \ 

ST.   MARTIN  S   STREET,   LONDON 
1909 

All  righta  reserved 


©amiittligt: 

PEINTED  BT  JOHN  CIiAY,  MJL 
AT  THE  DNITIBSITr  FBEES. 


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TO 

F.  G.  M. 


(hiXrpov  yap  avverifiwrarov  Koi  Se<Tfi6<;  a\uTO?  evvoiai  kv(OTtKrj<s 

7]  TOV  ivoii  deOV  TLflTj. 

Philo,  De  Specialibus  Legihus,  Lib.  i.  {De  Monorchia) 
Chap.  VII.  (Mangey  ii.  p.  219). 


TO  a-vyyeve<;  ovx  aifiari  fierpeiTai  fiovov,  irpmavevova-r]';  dXt]- 
6eCa<;,  dWa  irpd^eav  o/jloiottjti  kuI  dripa  r&v  avrdSv. 

Philo,  De  Naibilitate,  Chap.  i. 
(Mangey  11.  p.  438). 


nt  1DW  »Ntv  p  -mini  i^na  '?b  nt  nois  sa^PV  '3i  -l^^^  "1^^^  "^''^ 
!?'Kin  nDNn  n^k'  KDimn  un  nos   :nm  hm  '?^3  nr  -mx  nn^in  itB 
VI  p  n^t:-!;  ds  -'DV  nun  'jS'n*  'n'?^pnji  ^'«in  'oy  nun  ntan'  ^nnnnsi 

:  inis  HE'S?  D'n'?K  niana  •  nT3»  nnx  'D'? 

Sifra  89  b  on  Lev.  xix.  i8,  and  Genesis  Kabba  Cbap.  xiiv.  ad  fin. 
Cp.  Bacher,  Die  Agada  der  Tannaiten,  VoL  I.  p.  417,  n.  4, 
p.  422,  n.  1.    (Ed.  2,  1903.) 


a-o(j)ia...nia  8e  oJtra  TrarTa  Svvarai,  Koi  fiivovaa  cv  avrr)  ra  iravra  icaivi^ei, 
Kcii  Kara  yevfas  els  yj/vxas  ocrias  jicrajiaivovaa  (fiiXovs  deov  Kal  7rpo0i)Tas 
KoracrKevd^et. 

Wisdom  of  Solomon  vii.  27. 


The  Country  Parson... as  he  doth  not  so  study  others  as  to  neglect  the 
grace  of  God  in  himself  and  what  the  Holy  Spirit  teacheth  him,  so  doth  he 
assure  himself  that  God  in  all  ages  hath  had  his  servants,  to  whom  he  hath 
revealed  his  Truth  as  well  as  to  him  ;  and  that  as  one  Country  doth  not  bear 
all  things,  that  there  may  be  a  Commerce,  so  neither  hath  God  opened  or 
will  open  all  to  one,  that  there  may  be  a,  traffick  in  knowledge  between  the 
servants  of  God  for  the  planting  both  of  love  and  humility. 

George  Herbert,  The  Country  Parson,  Chap.  iv. 
"The  Parson's  Knowledge." 


The  Humble,  Meek,  Merciful,  Just,  Pious  and  Devout  Souls  are  every- 
where of  one  Religion  ;  and  when  Death  has  taken  off  the  Mask,  they  will 
know  one  another,  though  the  divers  Liveries  they  wear  here  makes  them 

Strangers. 

Some  Fruits  of  Solitude,  by  William  Penn. 
(Part  I.  Number  519.) 


PEEFACE 


I  HAVE  sufficiently  explained  the  nature  and  object  of  my 
book  in  the  Introduction  and  in  the  opening  words  of  the 
commentary  upon  Mark.  It  is  unnecessary  to  recapitulate  what 
is  there  said. 

It  had  been  for  many  years  the  desire  of  my  friend  Mr  Israel 
Abrahams,  Reader  in  Talmudic  and  Rabbinic  Literature  in  the 
University  of  Cambridge,  and  myself  to  join  together  in  some 
work  upon  the  New  Testament.  The  Additional  Notes  which  he 
is  going  to  contribute  to  the  present  book  will  be  a  partial  fulfil- 
ment of  our  old  desire.  I  had  greatly  hoped  that  these  Notes,  in 
which  Mr  Abrahams'  wealth  of  Rabbinic  learning  will  be  used  to 
illustrate  and  explain  the  Gospel  text,  would  have  appeared 
together  with  my  own  commentary.  I  keenly  trust,  though  this 
hope  has  been,  to  my  deep  regret,  disappointed,  that  they  will 
appear  (as  the  third  and  concluding  volume  of  the  work)  before 
the  end  of  1 910.  It  is  right  to  add  that  while  Mr  Abrahams  and 
I  are  in  general  accord  in  our  estimate  of  the  Gospels,  he  is  in  no 
way  responsible  for  what  I  have  written,  and  does  not,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  agree  with  every  part  of  it. 

For  the  benefit  of  my  Jewish  readers  (for  whom  my  book  is 
specially  intended)  I  have  given  the  translation  of  each  Gospel 
separately,  and  as  a  whole,  before  the  commentary  upon  it.  I  am 
anxious  that  they  should  first  of  all  read  the  story  as  it  stands, 
undisturbed  by  breaks  or  verse  divisions  or  remarks.  The  trans- 
lation is  then  repeated  before  each  section  of  the  commentary. 
The  character  of  the  translation  is  set  forth  in  §  2  of  the  Intro- 
duction. 


At  an  early  stage  of  the  book  Dr  Carpenter,  the  Principal  of 
Manchester  College,  Oxford,  was  good  enough  to  read  through 
a  considerable  portion  of  the  commentary,  I  owe  a  great  deal  to 
his  suggestions,  and  I  have  ventured  to  include  (without  asking 
his  permission)  some  of  the  observations  which  he  pencilled  upon 
the  margin  of  the  paper  into  the  body  of  my  work.  In  most  cases 
I  have  added  his  name. 

The  book  does  not  pretend  to  learning.  If  it  were  not  for  my 
special  point  of  view,  I  should  have  no  justification  to  write  upon 
the  Gospels  at  all,  and  in  any  case  I  am  keenly  conscious  of  my 
own  temerity  and  inadequacies.  There  are  numbers  of  books 
which  any  scholar  ought  to  have  read  and  absorbed,  whereas  I, 
partly  through  lack  of  leisure,  have  entirely  neglected  them. 
And  the  textual  side  of  Gospel  study  I  have  almost  wholly 
omitted  from  view.  If  it  be  asked :  '  Why  then  do  you  venture 
to  throw  your  work  at  the  public?',  I  can  only  reply  that  the 
peculiar  point  of  view,  to  which  I  have  alluded,  may,  I  hope,  make 
my  book  of  some  interest  and  use  to  a  few  persons  in  my  own 
religious  community  and  to  a  few  persons  outside  it. 

Though  I  speak  of  a  '  peculiar  point  of  view,'  it  hardly  needs 
saying  that  I  am  specially  dependent  upon  the  labours  and  re- 
searches of  the  great  scholars  who  have  given  their  lives  to 
Biblical  or  New  Testament  study.  The  names  and  the  books  of 
those  to  whom  I  have  most  frequently  gone  for  help  will  all  be 
mentioned  in  the  course  of  the  commentary:  I  ought,  however, 
here  to  state  that  the  writers  to  whom  I  owe  the  most,  and  have 
quoted  most  often,  are  Loisy  and  Wellhausen,  and  next  to  them, 
I  think,  H.  J.  Holtzmann  and  Johannes  Weiss.  But  I  must  con- 
fess, to  my  shame,  that  I  have  not  yet  been  able  to  study  the 
works  of  Dr  E.  A.  Abbott.  This  grave  omission,  from  which  my 
book  is  bound  to  have  suffered  greatly,  I  hope  to  make  good  upon 
some  future  occasion. 

I  owe  the  index  to  the  care  and  patience  of  my  friend  and 
secretary.  Miss  W.  Seymour,  to  whom  my  best  thanks  are  due. 


PREFACE  Lr 


List  of  those  authorities  who  are  quoted 
UNDER  Abbreviations 

Loisy  (Alfred).     Les   ifevangiles   83nttoptiques.     (1907.)     2   Vols. 
Cited  as  E.  S. 

WcUhausen  (Julius).     Das  Evangelium  MarcL     (ed.  1.)     (1903.) 
Das  Evangelium  Matthaei.     (1904.) 
Das  Evangelium  Lucae.     (1904.) 
Einleitung  in  die  drei  ersten  Evangelien.     (1905.) 

Where  the  reference  is  obviously  to  the  commentary  upon 
the  particular  Gospel  concerned,  I  have  quoted  it  simply  as 
W.    References  to  the  JEinleitung  are  given  thus  :  W.  Einlei- 


"Weiss  (Johannes).    Die  Schriften  des  Neuen  Testaments  ubersetzt 

und...erklart  [by  J.  Weiss  and  other  scholars]. 

Vol.    I.      Die  drei   alteren    Evangelien,    von  J.    Weiss. 

2nd  ed.     (1907.)     Referred  to  as  'J.  Weiss.' 
Carpenter  (J.  E.).     The   first  three   Gospels ;    their   origin   and 

relations.     4th  ed.     (1906.)     Quoted  as  'Carpenter.' 
Holtzmann  (H.  J.).     Die  Synoptiker  (in  the  Hand-Comraentar 

zum  Neuen  Testament).    3rd  ed.    (1901.)    Quoted  as  '  Holtz- 
mann.' 
Weiss  (Bernard).     Die  Quellen  des  Lukas  Evangeliums.     (1907.) 

Quoted  as  B.  Weiss,  Quellen  A. 
Weiss  (Bernard).     Die  Quellen  der  synoptischen  Ueberlieferung. 

(1908.)     Quoted  as  B.  Weiss,  Quellen  B. 
Allen  (W.   C).     A  critical  and  exegetioal  commentary  on  the 

Gospel    according    to    S.    Matthew.      (1907.)      Quoted    as 

'Allen.' 
Gould  (N.).     A  critical  and  exegetical  commentary  on  the  Gospel 

according  to  S.  Mark.     (1901.)     Quoted  as  'Gotdd.' 
Menzies  (A.).     The   Earliest   Gospel  (a   commentary  on   Mark). 

(1901.)     Quoted  as  'Menzies.' 
Plummer  (A.).     A    critical   and   exegetical   commentary  on   the 

Gospel  according  to  S.  Luke.     4th  ed.     (1901.)     Quoted  as 

'  Plummer.' 


X  PREFACE 

Swete  (H.  B.).  The  Gospel  according  to  S.  Mark.  2nd  ed. 
(1908.)     Quoted  as  'Swete.' 

Klostermann  (Erich).  Commentary  on  Mark,  forming  the  first 
part  of  'Die  Evangelien'  in  the  Handbuch  zum  Neuen 
Testament.     (1907.)     Quoted  as  '  Klostermann.' 

(The  commentary  on  Matthew  appeared  too  late  for  me  to  use.) 

[N.B.  I  should  like  to  add  that  I  was  only  able  to  use 
Professor  B.  W.  Bacon's  '  The  beginnings  of  Gospel  story '  (a  com- 
mentary upon  Mark),  1909,  in  revising  my  Introduction.  And  my 
book  was  printed  off  before  I  could  make  any  use  of  Wendling's 
Die  Entstehung  des  Marcus  Evangeliums  (1908)  Nicolardot,  Les 
ProcMds  de  Ridaction  des  Trois  Premiers  Evangelistes,  1908,  and 
Sharman's  The  Teaching  of  Jesus  about  the  Future  according  to 
the  Synoptic  Gospels,  1909.] 

C.  G.  M. 

September,  1909. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


VOL.  I. 


Inteoduction  (pp.  xvii — cviii). 

SECTION  rkG-E 

1.  Character  of  the  work  :  the  Jews  and  the  Gospels  :  the  Jewish 

point  of  view xvii 

2.  Contents  of   the  work :    the  Synoptic   Gospels :    origin  and 

meaning  of  the  word  'synoptic' xx 

3.  The  sort  of  books  the  Synoptic  Gospels  are :  their  dates  and 

their  sources xxii 

4.  The  Gospel  of  Mark.     Who  was  Mark?    The  statements  of 

Papias XXV 

5.  The  relation  of  Peter  to  the  Gospel  of  Mark          .        .        .  xxvii 

6.  Mark  and  Paul          ....                                          .  xxxi 

7.  The  soiu-ces  of  Mark         ...                         ...  xxxiii 

8.  The  supposed  narrative  source xxxiv 

9.  The  'speech'  or  'sayings'  document  known  as  Q.     The  rela- 

tion of  Mark  to  this  source ixxvi 

10.  Wellhausen,  Jiilicher,  and  Harnack  on  Mark  and  Q      .        .  xxxviii 

11.  Date  and  divisions  of  Mark xli 

12.  The  Gospel  of  Matthew :   its  relation  to  Mark       .                .  xlii 

13.  The  relation  of  Matthew  and  Luke  to  Q         .  xliii 

14.  Harnack's  estimate  of  the  size  and  character  of  Q                 .  xliv 

15.  The  parallels  of  Q  with  Mark xlvi 

16.  Date  and  origin  of  Q .  xlvii 

17.  Tests  for  authenticity  of  sayings  attributed  to  Jesus     .        .  xlviii 

18.  The  theories  of  Mr  Allen  and  Professor  Burton     ...  1 

19.  Other  sources  of  Matthew  besides  Q  and  Mark.     The  "doubly 

attested  sayings"    ....                                          .  lii 

20.  Matthew  as  editor.     His  point  of  view.     His  relation  to  Juda- 

ism and  the  Old  Testament.     His  date       ....  liii 


xu 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


SECTION 

21.  Is  Matthew  'catholic'  or  Judseo-Christian ?     .        •        •        • 

22.  'Kingdom  of  heaven'  in  Matthew  :  authenticity  of  the  parables 

peculiar  to  Matthew 

Loisy  on  Matthew 

Benan  on  Matthew 

The  Gospel  of  Luke  and  its  sources 

B.  Weiss  and  Loisy  on  the  sources  of  Luke  . 

Date  of  Luke.     The  'great  Insertion' 

Luke's  Gentile  point  of  view:  his  sympathy  for  'sinners   and 

the  poor  :  the  authenticity  of  his  special  material :  his  date 
The  relation  of  date  to  authenticity        .        .        .        • 
The  condition  of  the  Jews  during  the  age  of  Jesus 
The  Law  and  the  State  :   classes  of  the  people :  Rabbis  and 

Pharisees .         ■ 

The  Law  and  the  infant  Church  :  persecution  and  intolerance 
The  Messianic  hope.     Did  all  classes  observe  the  Law  ?    . 
The  'Am  ha-aretz '  and  the  neglected  '  multitudes '    . 
The  various  classes  of  people  with  whom  Jesus  came  in  contact 

formalists  and  outcasts  ;  liberals  and  apocalyptLsta.     The 


23- 

24. 

25- 

26. 
27. 
28. 

29. 

SC- 
32- 

33- 
34- 
35- 


36. 

37- 

38. 
39- 

40. 

41- 
42. 

43- 

44- 
45- 
46. 

47- 

48. 

49- 
50. 


The  contradictions  of  Judaism  :  the  one  God  and  the  national 

cult 

Were  the  Jews  and  the  Rabbis  of  a.d.  30  religiously  inferior  to 

those  of  300  and  600  a.d.  1 

The  condition  of  Galilee  in  the  age  of  Jesus 

The  '  prophetic '  character  and  mission   of  Jesus  :    the  '  lost 

sheep ' :   the  Kingdom  of  God  :   Jesus  and  the  Law    . 
Jesus  as  healer  :   the  forgiveness  of  sins 
Jesus  and  the  claim  to  Messiahship         .... 

The  relation  of  Jesus  to  God 

Changes  made  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus  after  his  death :  (a)  Israel 

and  the  Gentiles  ;  the  Pharisees  and  the  Law 
(6)  The  Messiahship  and  the  relation  to  God 
The  various  problems  raised  by  the  life  of  Jesus  . 
The  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah  and  the  conception 

formed  by  Jesus 

Jesus  and  the  '  masses  *.....  .        . 

Jesus  as  prophet :  did  he  intend  to  found  a  new  religion  ? 

The  Gospels,  the  New  Testament  and  the  Jew 

The  Gospels,  the  Rabbinical  Literature,  and  Judaism    . 


Iv 

Ivi 
Iviii 

liz 

ixir 

l:iii 

ixiv 
kvii 
Iiviii 

Ixix 

Ixxi 

Ixxiv 

IzzT 


Ixxvii 

Ittt 

Ixxxii 
Ixxiiii 

Ixxxiv 
Ixiivii 
Ixxxviii 

Ixxxix 

zc 
xcii 
iciv 

xcvi 

xcix 

zc 

ci 

ciii 


Translation  of  the  Gospel  according  to  Mark 
(pp.  1—37). 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS  xm 


Commentary  (with  tbanslation)  upon  the  Gospel  accoeding 
TO  Mark  (pp.  38 — 392). 

PAQE 

A.  The  Prelude.     Chapter  i.  i — 13. 

(i)    John  the  Baptist 38 

(2)  The  Baptism  of  Jesus  .        .  .  .45 

(3)  The  Temptation •        ■        •  55 

B.  The  Ministry  in  Galilee  and  in  the  territory  of  Philip,    i.  14 — 

vii.  23. 

(i)     The  Mission  in  Galilee 56 

(2)  The  call  of  Simon,  Andrew,  James,  and  John          .        .  61 

(3)  Jesus  in  the  Synagogue  at  Capernaum  ;  the  unclean  Spirit  63 

(4)  The  mother-in-law  of  Simon  Peter  ;  many  healings         .  67 

(5)  Further  activity  in  Galilee 68 

(6)  The  healing  of  the  leper 70 

(7)  Healing  of  the  paralytic  man 74 

(8)  The  call  of  Levi ;  Jesus  eats  with  sinners  and  tax-collectors  84 

(9)  Fasting 87 

(10)  The  Sabbath 9c 

Note  on  the  'Son  of  Man' 93 

(11)  Healing  on  the  Sabbath 107 

(12)  Many  healings     .        .                 110 

(13)  The  twelve  Apostles .112 

(14)  Attack  and  defence    ...                 ....  114 

(15)  Jesus  and  his  family 118 

(16)  The  parable  of  the  Sower 120 

(17)  The  hidden  and  the  revealed  ;  measure  for  measure        .  126 

(18)  The  seed  that  grows  of  itself 129 

(19)  The  mustard  seed 132 

(20)  Storm  at  sea 134 

(21)  The  Gadarene  swine 136 

(22)  The  daughter  of  Jairus  and  the  woman  with  an  issue   .  140 

(23)  The  cold  reception  of  Jesus  at  Nazareth  ....  145 

(24)  The  sending  of  the  Twelve 147 

(25)  Jesus,  Herod  Antipas,  and  John  the  Baptist  .        .        .150 

(26)  The  return  of  the  Apostles  and  the  feeding  of  the  five 

thousand  .        .                 ...                                  .  153 

(27)  Jesus  walks  on  the  lake     .        .  .  .156 

(28)  The  washing  of  hands 160 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


C. 


Jesus  journeys  northwards  into  Tynan  territory,  then  through 
Deoapolis  and  the  territory  of  Philip,  back  to  Galilee,  vii. 
24 — ix.  50. 


D. 


(I) 
(2) 
(3) 
(4) 
(S) 
(6) 
(7) 
(8) 
(9) 
(10) 

(") 


The  northward  journey  and  the  Phoenician  woman 

Healing  of  a  deaf  and  dumb  man     . 

Feeding  of  the  four  thousand    . 

A  sign  refused    ...  •         ■ 

The  lack  of  bread 

A  blind  man  healed 

Jesus  the  suffering  Messiah ;  Peter  and  Jesus 
The  Transfiguration  ....  .  •  • 
The  epileptic  child  .....  •  ■ 
Second  prediction  of  suffering,  death  and  the  Resurrection 
Who  is  the  greatest? — Of  stumbling-blocks  and  other 
matters 


X.  1  —  52. 


Jesus  on  the  way  to  Jerusalem. 

(i)  Of  divorce .        • 

(2)  Jesus  and  the  children 

(3)  The  danger  of  riches ;  wealth  and  the  Kingdom 

(4)  Third  prediction  of  suffering  and  death    . 

(5)  The  sons  of  Zobedee 

(6)  Bartimaeus 


E.  The  entry  of  Jesus  into  Jerusalem  and  his  teaching  in  the  city. 

xi.  I — xiii.  37. 

(i)  The  entry  into  Jerusalem 

(2)  The  barren  fig  tree     . 

(3)  The  purification  of  the  Temple 

(4)  The  fig  tree  and  faith 

(5)  The  authority  of  John 

(6)  The  parable  of  the  vineyard 

(7)  'Give  unto  Caesar' 

(8)  The  woman  taken  in  adultery  (John  vii.  53 — viii.  11) 

(9)  The  life  of  the  resurrection 

(10)  The  greatest  commandment 

(11)  Whose  Son  is  the  Messiah! 

(12)  Attack  upon  the  Scribes    . 

(13)  The  widow's  mite 

(14)  The  End  and  the  'Parousia'     . 

F.  The  Passion  and  Resurrection,     xiv.  i — xvi.  20. 

(i)    The  decision  of  the  Priests  and  Scribes 
(2)    The  anointing  in  Bethany  . 


177 
182 
184 
186 
188 
190 
192 
212 
217 

222 
223 


234 
242 
245 

256 
261 


264 
269 
271 
272 

274 
276 

279 
2S2 
284 
286 
290 
294 
295 
297 


308 


TABLE  OP  CONTENTS 


XV 


(3)  The  betrayal        .... 

(4)  Preparation  for  the  Passover  meal 

(5)  Prediction  of  the  betrayal . 

(6)  The  Last  Supper 

(7)  Peter's  denial  foretold 

(8)  Qethsemane 

(9)  The  arrest  . 

(10)  The  trial  before  the  Sanhedrin  . 

(11)  Peter's  denial 

(12)  Jesus  before  Pilate 

(13)  Jesus,  Pilate  and  Barabbas 

(14)  Jesus  is  mocked  by  the  soldiers 

(15)  The  Crucifijcion   . 

(16)  The  death  of  Jesus 

(17)  The  women  who  saw 

(18)  The  burial  of  Jesus    . 

(19)  The  empty  tomb 

(20)  Later  version  of  the  Eesurrection 

Note  on  Mark  xii.  i — 11  , 


PAOE 

316 

317 

3>9 
321 

333 
335 
341 
344 
357 
359 
362 
366 
368 
371 
376 
377 
386 

390 

392 


INTRODUCTION 

§  I.     Character  of  the  work:   the  Jews  and  the  Gospels: 
the  Jewish  point  of  view. 

The  task  which  I  have  set  before  myself  in  this  book  is,  I  am 
fully  aware,  far  too  great  for  my  narrow  learning  and  capacities, 
yet  it  is  one  which  so  urgently  needs  doing  that  I  have  ventured 
to  make  a  small  beginning  towards  its  accomplishment. 

The  book  is  fragmentary  and  tentative.  A  Jewish  commentary 
to  the  entire  New  Testament  is  required,  and  here  I  have  only 
given  a  commentary  upon  a  portion.  Moreover,  it  is  fragmentary 
and  tentative  for  other  reasons  as  well.  If  I  had  waited  for 
several  inore  years  I  might  have  gained  much  fresh  knowledge, 
and  naodified  many  opinions  here  expressed.  But  it  seemed  best 
to  wait  no  longer.  Life  is  uncertain,  and  other  duties  make  the 
hours  which  can  be  given  to  study  few  and  sometimes  even  far 
between. 

The  book  is  also  tentative  because  I  am  in  many  respects 
a  pioneer.  For  of  Jewish  exposition  of  the  Gospels  there  has 
been  little.  Endless  Christian  commentaries  exist,  written  from 
many  different  points  of  view,  with  great  learning  and  splendid 
patience,  but  Jewish  commentaries  can  hardly  be  said  to  exist  at 
all.  Jewish  scholars  have  usually  taken  up  an  attitude  towards 
the  New  Testament,  and  more  especially  towards  the  Gospels, 
which  does  not  lend  itself  to  impartiality.  It  has  not  been  a  very 
fruitful  and  light-giving  attitude.  A  main  effort  has  been  to  show 
that  to  various  admittedly  admirable  sayings  of  Jesus  reported  in 
the  Gospels  there  are  excellent  parallels  in  the  Old  Testament  or 
the  Rabbinical  writings.  An  atomistic  treatment  has  usually  been 
adopted.  The  teaching  of  Jesus  has  not  been  much  discussed  and 
appraised  as  a  whole.  And  where  it  has  been  so  discussed,  the 
line  has  been  rather  to  depreciate  or  to  cheapen.  Jewish  writers 
have  either  looked  for  parallels  or  for  defects.  Considering  what 
Judaism  and  the  Jews  have  had  to  suffer  at  Christian  hands,  this 
Jewish  treatment  of  the  Gospels  is  not  astonishing.     No  wonder 

M.  b 


xviii  INTRODUCTION 

that  the  Jews  should  show  some  injustice  towards  the  literary 
origins  of  a  religion  from  the  adherents  of  which  they  have 
suffered  such  gross  and  terrible  wrongs.  No  wonder  that  they 
should  express  some  disdain  at  this  supposed  superior  and  super- 
fine  teaching  of  love  which,  so  far  as  they  are  concerned,  has  so 
generally  proved  itself  a  religion  of  violence,  cruelty  and  hate. 
No  wonder  that  they  should  desire  to  defend  the  excellence  of 
their  own  religious  writings  and  of  their  own  religion,  which  have 
been  so  constantly  depreciated  and  misunderstood  by  Christian 
writers.     All  this  is  quite  human,  quite  natural. 

It  may  be  added  that  till  just  recent  times  it  was  scarcely 
possible  for  Jews  to  dissociate  the  Christian  claim  that  Jesus  lived 
an  exceptional  life,  and  that  his  teaching  was  uniquely  great  and 
original,  from  the  further  Christian  claim  that  he  was  divine,  or 
indeed  that  he  was  God.  It  was  the  divinity  of  Jesus  that  was 
for  Jews  the  true  stumblingblock  to  any  scientific  estimate  of  his 
teaching.  If  all  Christians  had  been  Unitarians  from  the  first, 
a  drawing  together  and  a  good  understanding  between  Jew  and 
Christian  as  regards  the  place  of  Jesus  in  the  history  of  Judaism 
and  of  religion  would  have  been  far  easier.  The  objections  to 
Jesus  as  a  heretic,  or  as  an  iconoclast,  or  as  a  critic  of  the  Law, 
would  not  have  been  so  insuperably  difiicult.  Moreover,  for  many 
centuries  to  say  that  Jesus  was  a  good  man  and  a  fine  teacher, 
but  not  divine,  was  exceedingly  dangerous.  It  meant  the  stake 
or  the  sword.  Hence  to  keep  complete  silence  was  much  easier, 
and  this  negative  attitude  gradually  became  extremely  general. 
And  when  the  danger  of  speech  was  removed,  the  old  objections 
and  stumblingblocks  were  still  in  force. 

Yet  in  England  the  time  has  come  when  it  is  right  and  possible 
for  a  Jew  to  look  at  the  Gospels  in  a  more  historical,  comprehensive 
and  impartial  spirit.  This  at  all  events  is  my  aim,  and  though 
I  am  very  deficient  in  learning,  the  circumstances  of  my  educa- 
tion, environment  and  life,  perhaps  too  the  'cross  bench '.cast  of 
mind  with  which  I  chanced  to  be  bom,  have  given  me  some 
advantages  for  its  partial  attainment. 

I  do  not  want  to  depreciate  the  Rabbis  or  their  teaching,  but 
I  have  no  desire  unduly  to  exalt  them.  And  at  the  same  time  I 
do  not  want  to  depreciate  Jesus  or  unduly  to  exalt  him.  It  may 
sometimes  be  necessary  to  indicate  parallels  or  contrasts,  but  the 
object  which  I  have  set  before  myself  is  to  find  neither  the  one 
nor  the  other.  So  far  as  I  can,  I  am  anxious  to  get  at  the  facts, 
and  to  let  them  speak  for  themselves ;  to  look  at  things  as  they 
really  are. 

Yet  I  know  that  one  cannot  get  rid  of  one's  upbringing  one's 
origin,  and  one's  own  peculiar  point  of  view.     I  have  no  doubt 


INTRODUCTION  xix 

that  a  Buddhist  or  Mohammedan  critic  would  be  able  to  detect  in 
my  book  many  a  prepossession  and  a  prejudice.  Yet  that  I  shall 
seem  to  Jewish  critics  too  Christian,  and  to  Christian  critics  too 
Jewish  is,  I  trust,  likely,  and  is  to  me  a  source  of  some  hope  that 
now  and  then  I  may  have  said  the  truth. 

I  also  realize  that  the  scientific  or  historical  character  of  the 
book  is  spoiled,  as  it  were  ab  initio,  by  the  fact  that  it  has  a  by  no 
means  purely  scientific  object.  The  book  has  been  mainly  written 
for  Jewish  readers,  though  I  fear  it  is  not  probable  that  many  will 
read  it.  It  has  turned  out  somewhat  too  long  and  too  dull.  It  is, 
however,  mainly  written  for  Jewish  readers,  though  I  hope  that 
a  few  Christian  readers  may  find  some  of  its  pages  not  without 
a  certain  interest. 

It  seems  to  me  (for  reasons  into  which  I  cannot  here  enter) 
that  it  is  of  great  importance  for  Jews  to  understand  and  appreciate 
aright  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus.  What  should  be  the  right 
relation  of  Judaism  to  that  teaching  ?  What  place  should  Jesus 
and  his  teaching  take  or  fill  in  the  religion  of  '  his  own  people ' 
to-day?  What  should  be  the  place  of  the  New  Testameut  in 
Jewish  eyes  and  for  the  Jewish  religion?  To  find  the  due  and 
proper  answer  to  these  questions  seems  to  me  one  of  the  most 
important  duties  which  lie  before  modern,  and  especially  before 
liberal,  Judaism.  Up  to  now,  the  work  has  been  hardly  tackled 
at  all,  at  least  not  to  any  serious  or  profitable  purpose.  And  this 
is  another  reason  why  my  own  book  is  tentative.  For  under  such 
circumstances,  when  a  man  is  not  following  in  a  well-beaten  path, 
it  is  not  likely  that  he,  in  his  loneliness,  will  make  much  progress. 
I  am  not  so  conceited  or  silly  as  not  to  realize  this.  Not  only  is 
my  own  book  but  a  commentary  upon  one  small  piece  (though 
the  most  important  piece)  of  the  New  Testament,  but  it  is  a  mere 
temporary  beginning,  a  provisional  contribution.  To  find  the  long- 
delayed  answers  to  so  large  a  problem  one  man  will  not  suffice,  or 
one  generation. 

I  shall  be  content  if  I  have  contributed  a  little  material  and 
a  few  unsystematic  suggestions  towards  the  right  and  final  answer 
— if  indeed  a  final  answer  there  can  ever  be.  This  commentary 
upon  the  Synoptic  Gospels  does  not  contain  (it  is  not  its  aim)  any 
systematic  presentation  of  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus  or  any 
systematic  discussion  of  the  relation  of  that  life  and  teaching  to 
modem  Judaism.  It  deals  with  the  various  points  as  they  arise 
in  their  place  in  the  narrative,  and  it  deals  with  them,  moreover, 
very  often  in  a  somewhat  halting  and  undecided  way. 

For  this  is  one  more  reason  why  my  book  is  tentative.  To 
several  of  the  problems  connected  with  the  life  of  Jesus,  and  to 
some  connected  with  his  teaching,  I  myself,  with  the  material  at 

62 


XX  INTRODUCTION 

our  command,  do  not,  so  far,  see  my  way  to  any  clean-cut  and 
decisive  replies.  Thus,  when  I  do  not  feel  sure,  I  prefer  to  express 
my  uncertainty.  I  have  freely  quoted  from  the  works  of  great 
scholars  and  distinguished  authorities.  The  reader  will,  at  all 
events,  hear  what  they  think,  and  perhaps  he  will  judge  between 
them  more  rapidly  or  confidently  than  I,  so  far,  have  been  able 
to  do.  The  quotations  are  almost  all  from  the  works  of  great 
Christian  scholars,  German,  French,  and  English.  Though  I  have, 
as  it  were,  sat  at  the  feet  of  these  scholars,  and  learned  from  them 
a  very  great  deal,  I  have  not  hesitated  to  point  out  where,  from 
my  Jewish  point  of  view,  they  seem  to  me  prejudiced  and  therefore 
inaccurate,  or  when  they  seem  ignorant  of  matters  about  which  a 
more  intimate  knowledge  of  Jewish  thought,  and  a  more  intimate 
experience  of  Jewish  life,  can  bring  correction. 

That  my  own  book  may  be  soon  superseded  by  another  book 
from  a  Jewish  pen  which  will  be  more  learned,  more  impartial, 
and  more  conclusive  than  mine,  I  earnestly  hope.  Meanwhile 
even  provisional  books  and  provisional  suggestions  may  have  their 
temporary  uses.  Such,  I  hope,  may  be  the  case  with  mine.  If 
its  readers  will  judge  it  as  a  whole,  they  will  judge  it  as  it  asks  to 
be  judged. 


§  2.     Contents  of  the  work :  the  Synoptic  Gospels : 
origin  and  meaning  of  the  word  synoptic. 

My  work  consists  of  a  translation  of,  and  a  commentary  upon, 
the  first  three  Gospels — Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke,  or  according 
to  the  order  in  which  they  are  here  placed — Mark,  Matthew,  and 
Luke.  The  translation  is  based  upon  the  Authorised  Version. 
I  have,  however,  made  many  changes,  mainly  in  order  to  obtain 
greater  accuracy.  Sometimes  the  variation  is  due  to  the  fact 
that  a  better  and  earlier  Greek  text  can  now  be  obtained  than 
was  known  to  the  translators  of  King  James's  Version  or  to  their 
predecessors.  Occasionally  the  changes  are  due  to  the  omission 
of  an  archaism.  (I  fancy  that  many  Jewish  readers  coming  to 
the  Authorised  Version  of  the  New  Testament  for  the  first  time 
would  suppose  that  John  the  Baptist's  head  was  brought  tq 
Herod  upon  a  horse.)  I  have,  however,  not  sought  to  produce  a,  ■ 
consistently  modern  version,  though  I  have  derived  help  and 
benefit  from  a  frequent  consultation  of  Dr  Moflfatt's  and  of 
Dr  Weymouth's  interesting  translations. 

The  first  three  Gospels  are  frequently  called  the  Synoptic 
Gospels,  because  'they  are  all  constructed  on  a  common  plan, 
and  from  first  to  last,  amid  minor  difi'eiences,  the  teaching  and 


INTRODUCTION  xxi 

work  of  Jesus  are  presented  from  the  same  general  point  of 
view'  (Carpenter,  First  Three  Gospels,  p.  7).  The  use  of  the 
word  Synoptic  as  applied  to  the  first  three  Gospels  is  due  to 
J.  J.  Griesbaoh,  a  German  theologian  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
In  1774  he  published  the  first  part  of  a  new  edition  of  the 
'  historical  books  of  the  New  Testament,'  containing  a  synopsis  of 
the  Gospels  of  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke.'  In  his  preface  (p.  iv.) 
he  states  that  the  ordinary  editions  of  the  Gospels  are  unsuited  to 
students.  '  For,'  says  he — and  as  not  one  person  in  a  thousand  is 
likely  to  look  up  Griesbach's  book,  his  actual  words  (translated 
from  the  Latin)  are  worth  quoting — 'in  the  first  place,  if  Matthew, 
Mark,  and  Luke  are  commented  on  one  by  one  in  the  order  in 
which  they  follow  one  another,  the  frequent  repetitions  of  narratives 
recorded  by  two  of  them,  or  by  all  three,  steal  aWay  too  large  a 
portion  of  our  small  span  of  time  without  any  corresponding 
advantage.  Hence  it  seemed  worth  while  to  construct  a  sort  of 
synopsis  of  these  three  Gospels,  in  which  the  parts  common  to  all 
three,  or  to  two  of  them,  should  be  put  side  by  side  in  such  a  way 
that  the  interpretation  of  one  Evangelist  should  serve  to  make  the 
rest  intelligible,  or  at  least  leave  but  a  few  points  over  for  ex- 
planation. Indeed  one  may  hope  that  a  synopsis  of  this  kind  will 
contain  several  advantages.'  There  had  been  harmonies  of  the 
Gospels  compiled  before  for  apologetic  purposes.  Griesbach  is 
careful  to  point  out  that  his  new  synopsis  is  not  one  of  these. 
Later  commentators  on  the  basis  of  what  Griesbach  had  done,  used 
the  adjective  synoptic  to  characterize  those  first  three  Gospels  of 
which  it  was  possible  and  useful  to  form  a  synopsis.  I  have  not, 
however,  discovered  who  was  the  first  man  to  do  this.  Perhaps 
I  should  add  for  those  of  my  readers  who  know  no  Greek  that 
sun  (arvv)  in  Greek  means  'with'  and  opsis  (o'i|rts)  means  'look, 
appearance,  sight.'  Hence  sunopsis  (<Tvvoy]n';)  means  'a  seeing 
together,  a  general  view.'  The  adjectives  svnoptos  (o-uvottto?),  'that 
can  be  seen  at  a  glance,'  and  sunoptikos  (ffwoTrriKo?),  '  seeing  the 
whole  together,'  are  both  used  by  good  Greek  writers. 

It  will,  therefore,  be  noticed  that  of  the  four  Gospels  this 
book  only  includes  three.  The  fourth,  the  Gospel  of  John,  ia 
omitted.  The  reason  is  that,  whilst  the  first  three  Gospels  treat 
their  subject  from  this  common  point  of  view  and  arrangement, 
the  fourth  is  different  in  both.  It  has  a  different  conception  of 
Jesus,  and  tells  in  many  respects  a  different  history.  The  words 
which  it  puts  into  Jesus's  mouth  are  peculiar  and  special.  More- 
over, this  fourth  Gospel  is  less  historic  than  the  first  three ;  it 
gives  'an  interpretation  of  the  person  and  work  of  Jesus  rather 
than  a  record  of  his  words  and  deeds'  {First  Three  Gospels,  p.  9). 
Notable,  great  and  important  as  this  Gospel  is,  it  can — and  indeed 


xxii  INTRODUCTION 

must— be  studied  by  itself,  and  not  together  or  in  conjunction 
with  the  first,  the  allied,  three.  Therefore  it  forms  no  part  ot  the 
present  more  limited  undertaking.  For  that  undertaking,  though 
limited,  is  yet  sufficiently,  and  more  than  sufficiently,  arduous, 
intricate,  and  obscure. 


§  3.     The  sort  of  hooks  the  Synoptic  Gospels  are : 
their  dates  and  their  sources. 

"What  sort  of  books  are  these  first  three  Gospels  1  The 
answer  is  best  obtained  by  reading  them,  but  some  preliminary 
words  are  necessary  or  advantageous.  I  wish  I  could  just  transfer 
to  this  Introduction  the  pages  of  Dr  Carpenter's  book,  The  First 
Three  Gospels:  their  Origin  and  Relations.  It  contains  so  much 
in  so  small  a  space,  and  is  the  product  of  such  wide  knowledge 
and  such  high  impartiality.  I  have  quoted  from  it  already,  and 
shall  constantly  quote  from  it  again.  The  fourth  edition,  to  which 
my  references  belong,  was  published  in  1906  (by  Philip  Green, 
5  Essex  Street,  Strand,  London,  W.C),  and  costs  sixpence.  If 
all  my  Jewish  readers  at  least  would  spend  sixpence,  and  read 
Dr  Carpenter's  book  before  or  together  with  mine,  it  would  be 
a  great  advantage  for  them.  It  has  395  pages,  but  they  are  not 
big  ones.  Dr  Carpenter  writes  from  the  point  of  view  of  a 
Unitarian  Christian,  but  I  cannot  imagine  that  anyone,  whether 
Jew  on  the  one  hand,  or  Trinitarian  Christian  on  the  other, 
could  be  hurt  or  unprofited  by  his  words. 

The  first  three  Gospels  tell  of  the  life  and  death  and  alleged 
resurrection  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  The  word  Gospel  means  'good 
spel,'  'spel'  signifying  'speech'  or  'story.'  It  is  thus  intended  to 
be  a  literal  translation  of  the  Greek  word  ei/ayyikiov  (euangelion) 
or  '  good  tidings.'  We  keep  the  Greek  in  the  word  '  evangelist,' 
but  'evangel'  for  'Gospel'  is  rare.  German  and  French  both  use 
the  Greek  form :  les  ivangiles,  die  Evangelien.  When  we  speak  of 
the  four  Gospels,  or  of  the  Gospel  according  to  Mark,  we  mean 
the  particular  books  in  which  the  preaching  of  the  Good  Tidings 
and  the  life  of  the  preacher  are  recorded.  Some  remarks  upon 
the  original  meaning  of  the  word  will  be  found  in  the  note  on 
Mark  i.  r. 

The  Gospels,  like  the  books  of  the  Hebrew  prophets,  are  not 
easily  brought  under  any  previously  existing  class  or  category  of 
literature.  The  veteran  and  learned  theologian,  H.  J.  Holtzmann 
whose  little  prejudices  (as  they  seem  to  me)  I  have  now  and  then 
ventured  to  indicate,  but  from  whose  splendid  and  laborious  com- 
mentary, I,  like  hundreds  of  others,  have  freely  and  gratefully 


INTRODUCTION  xxm 

drawn,  rightly  says  of  the  Gospels:  '  Both  in  form  and  in  contentsN 
they  are  unique  in  ancient  literature:  they  form  a  group  by 
themselves,  and  they  cannot  be  assigned  to  any  of  the  traditional 
and  then  existing  classes  of  literary  composition — not  even  to  the 
class  of  Jewish  didactic  stories  which  would  seem  otherwise  to 
lie  nearest  at  hand'  (Hand-Gommentar,  third  edition,  p.  36). 
Some  admirably  suggestive  remarks  as  to  the  excellence  of  the 
Gospels  and  its  causes  are  given  by  Renaa  in  Les  ^vangiles,  ' 
chapters  v.  and  vi. 

The  first  question  that  suggests  itself  to  anybody  to  ask  about 
the  Gospels  is.  When  were  they  written  ?  As  to  that  question  no 
complete  agreement  has  yet  been  reached  by  scholars.  But  the 
limits  of  variation  are  not  very  wide.  It  is  generally  believed  that 
the  Gospel  according  to  Mark,  the  oldest  Gospel,  and  one  main 
source  of  the  other  two,  was  in  existence  in  the  form  in  which  we 
now  possess  it  very  soon  after  the  destruction  of  the  Temple  in 
70  A.D.  Matthew  and  Luke  are  later:  we  may  roughly  place 
them  somewhere  about  90  to  100  a.d.  We  have,  therefore,  to 
remember  that  the  earliest  Gospel  was  written  not  more  than 
forty  years  after  the  death  of  Jesus.  If  a  disciple  of  Jesus  was 
thirty  years  old  when  his  Master  died,  he  was  not  much  more 
than  seventy  years  old  when  the  Gospel  of  Mark  saw  the  light. 

But  we  are  able  to  push  even  the  literary  sources  for  the  life 
of  Jesus  still  further  back,  and  nearer  to  the  date  of  his  death 
(a.d.  29  or  30,  as  is  generally  supposed).  For  though  scholars  are 
not  even  yet  wholly  at  one  as  to  the  origin  and  character  of  Mark, 
still  it  is  pretty  generally  agreed  either  that  a  shorter  form  of  the 
Gospel,  as  we  now  possess  it — an  Urmarcus,  to  use  the  German 
word — or  that  one  or  more  of  Mark's  sources,  were  written  in 
Aramaic.  This  Urmarcus,  or  these  sources,  will  take  us  back 
some  ten  to  twenty  years  more,  that  is  from  /^o  to  50,  or  not  more 
than  20  years  after  the  death  of  Jesus. 

Again,  these  sources  were  either  themselves  drawn  up  by  eye- 
witnesses, or  they  drew  upon,  and  were  at  any  rate  the  partial 
product  of,  the  stories  and  reminiscences  of  persons  who  had 
actually  lived  and  talked  with  Jesus.  An  oral  tradition  was  at 
their  base,  and  is,  therefore,  at  the  base  of  Mark.  For  even  when 
Mark — the  Greek  Mark  as  we  have  it  now — was  written  and 
issued  in  its  present  form,  there  must  have  been  several  persons 
yet  living  who  had  seen  and  spoken  with  Jesus.  Still  more  must 
such  persons  (and  in  greater  numbers)  have  existed  when  the  first 
Aramaic  Urmarcus  or  when  the  earliest  Aramaic  sources  (in 
their  earliest  and  most  primitive  form)  were  composed. 

Jesus  himself,  so  far  as  we  know,  wrote  nothing.  He  had, 
however,   many  disciples,  and   eastern   disciples   of   an    eastern 


XXIV  INTEODUCTION 

Master  have  retentive  memories.  When  he  was  put  to  death/ 
there  must  have  "Been"  a  store  of  reminiscences  of  his  words 
and  deeds.  When  his  disciples  began  to  preach  that  he  was 
the  Messiah,  they  drew  upon  this  store.  They  comforted  them- 
selves for  the  loss  of  the  Master's  presence  by  repeating  his 
words  and  recalling  his  deeds.  At  first,  for  a  few  years  after  the 
crucifixion,  the  need  for  writing  down  these  reminiscences  may 
not  have  arisen;  all  the  more,  as  for  these  few  years  the  disciples 
still  expected  that  the  End  of  the  Age,  or,  as  we  may  also  call  it, 
the  End  of  the  World,  would  soon  ensue.  But  after  a  time  the 
necessity  for  such  written  records  would  naturally  make  itself  felt. 
The  disciples  and  eyewitnesses  became  fewer  and  died;  there  was 
a  danger  lest  the  words  and  deeds  of  the  Master  should  be  for- 
gotten or  wrongly  told;  as  the  new  religion — for  this  it  soon 
became — was  preached  to  ever  wider  circles,  the  need  for  written 
documents  became  greater.  Thus  in  the  most  natural  way  collec- 
tions of  the  Master's  sayings,  records  of  his  life  and  of  the  miracles 
which  he  wrought,  must  gradually  have  been  composed.  Luke, 
writing  about  90  to  ICX)  A.D.,  speaks  of  many  such  narratives  and 
collections  as  already  in  existence. 

We  naturally  ask,  What  relation  does  our  oldest  Gospel  bear 
to  these  oral  traditions  and  reminiscences  ?  Have  we  in  it  the 
exact  written  precipitate  or  record  of  what  contemporaries  and 
disciples  of  Jesus  saw  and  heard  ? 

This  is  a  very  difficult  question.  How  we  answer  it  partly 
depends  upon  our  different  points  of  view.  What  I  mean  will  be 
made  clear  by  an  example.  In  the  sixth  chapter  of  Mark  Jesus  is 
reported  to  have  made,  through  miraculous  multiplication,  five 
loaves  and  two  fishes  suffice  for  a  good  meal  to  five  thousand  men. 
He  is  also  reported  to  have  walked  upon  the  sea.  If  we  are 
willing  to  believe  these  miracles,  we  shall  be  inclined  to  say  that 
these  events  were  remembered  and  repeated  by  the  disciples,  and 
may  easily  enough  have  been  reported  to  the  author  of  the  Gospel 
of  Mark  by  a  man,  or  by  men,  who  actually,  saw  them  take  place. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  like  the  writer  of  this  book,  we  do  not 
believe  that  the  miracles  happened,  then  it  seems  tolerably  certain 
that  whatever  substratum  or  residue  of  non-miraculous  fact  these 
stories  may  contain,  they  could  not  have  been  directly  reported,  in 
the  form  in  which  we  now  possess  them,  to  the  writer  of  the 
Gospel  by  actual  eyewitnesses.  We  must,  at  any  rate,  assume 
that  the  eyewitnesses  thought  they  saw  a  miracle  when  they  did 
not  see  one,  or  that  they  exaggerated,  or  that  their  memories  soon 
gave  way.  Or  we  must  assume  that,  even  before  Mark  or  his 
sources  were  written,  many  of  the  eyewitnesses  had  died,  or  that 
the  writer  or  writers  drew  rather  from  the  general  volume  of 


INTRODUCTION  xxv 

popular  oral  tradition,  as  it  had  constituted  itself  in  the  Christian 
community,  and  as  it  was  floating  about  in  their  environment, 
than  from  the  direct  reports  and  communications  of  the  actual 
disciples  or  eyewitnesses  of  the  Master's  deeds  and  words.  It  is 
probable  that  for  different  stories  and  speeches  one  or  other  of  all 
these  various  'assumptions'  would  have  to  be  used.  The  facts 
require,  or  are  the  product  of,  all  of  them,  though  in  various 
degrees. 


§  4.     The  Gospel  of  Mark.     Who  was  Mark  ?     The 
statements  of  Papias. 

Passing  from  such  general  considerations,  one  asks  more 
specifically,  Is  anything  actually  known  as  to  the  origin  of  the 
oldest  Gospel  ?  Who  was,  Mark  ?  Is  he  the  author  of  the 
book  which  bears  his  name  ? 

There  was  a  John  Mark  of  whom  we  hear  several  times  in 
various  New  Testament  books.  His  mother's  name  was  Mary,  and 
she  lived  in  Jerusalem  and  belonged  to  the  Christian  community. 
To  her  house  Peter  is  said  to  have  come  when  he  escaped  from 
Herod's  prison  (Acts  xii.  12).  He  was  the  cousin  of  Barnabas 
(Colossians  iv.  10),  and  is  said  to  have  accompanied  the  aposble 
Paul  on  some  of  his  travels  (Acts  xii.  25,  xiii.  13,  xv.  37-39; 
Philemon  24;  2  Tim.  iv.  11).  Moreover  in  Jerusalem  Mark  is 
supposed  to  have  become  acquainted  with,  and  a  constant  com- 
panion of,  the  apostle  Peter.  In  the  first  Epistle  of  Peter  (v.  13) 
he  is  spoken  of  as  at  Rome.  'She  (i.e.  the  Church)  that  is  in 
Babylon  (i.e.  Rome)  salutes  you,  and  so  does  Mark  my  son  (i.e.  my 
spiritual  son).'  Thus  it  is  further  supposed  that  Mark  wrote  his 
Gospel  in  Rome.  And  to  Mark,  the  author  of  the  Gospel,  there  is 
supposed  by  some  to  be  an  allusion  in  the  Gospel  itself  (see  note 
on  xiv.  51,  52),  and  it  is  even  conjectured  that  the  place  of  the 
Last  Supper  was  the  house  of  Mark's  mother.  As  to  the  value  of 
these  traditions,  so  far  as  they  bear  upon  the  problem  of  the 
authorship  of  the  second  Gospel,  something  will  be  said  later  on. 

The  oldest  reference  to  Mark  as  a  writer  comes  from  Papias, 
Bishop  of  Hierapolis  in  Phrygia,  who  wrote  about  140-150  A.B. 
Excerpts  of  his  work  have  been  preserved  by  Eusebius,  Bishop  of 
Csesarea,  265-340  a.d.  Papias,  then,  is  quoted  by  Eusebius  as 
having  received  information  from  '  John  the  Eider,'  as  follows : 
'This  also  the  Elder  used  to  say:  Mark,  having  become  Peter's 
interpreter,  wrote  accurately  all  that  which  he  (Mark)  repeated  (or 
remembered),  though  not  in  order,  that  was  said  or  done  by  the 
Christ.     For  he  had  neither  heard  the  Lord  nor  followed  him,  but 


XXVI  INTRODUCTION 

afterwards,  as  I  have  said,  followed  Peter,  who  used  to  frame  his 
teachiog  according  to  the  needs  (of  his  hearers),  but  not  as  making 
a  connected  series,  or  narrative  (avvTa^iv),  of  the  Lord's  discourses 
(or  words).  So  Mark  committed  no  fault,  in  that  he  wrote  down 
(or,  as  having  written  down)  some  particulars  (evia)  just  as  he 
(Mark)  repeated  them  from  memory.  For  he  took  heed  (but)  to 
one  thing,  to  omit  none  of  the  facts  that  he  heard,  or  to  make  no 
false  statement  in  his  account  of  them.' 

In  this  statement  of  Papias  there  are  several  words  which  are 
a  little  uncertain,  and  as  a  whole  it  gives  rise  to  a  great  deal  of 
doubt  and  discussion. 

First,  as  to  a  few  of  the  details.  Up  to  what  point  is  Papias. 
quoting  the  Elder?  Probably  only  up  to  the  end  of  the  first 
sentence  ('  done  by  the  Christ ').  The  rest  is  the  commentary  of 
Papias.  Next,  what  is  the  meaning  of  'interpreter'  (e/j/iijKewTj;?)  ? 
Some  think  the  word  means  that  Mark  merely  became  the 
interpreter  of  Peter  by  writing  his  Gospel.  But  this  explanation 
is  extremely  unlikely.  The  word  6pfj/t]vevTil<;,  'interpreter,'  must 
indicate  a  personal  relationship.  And  the  probable  meaning  is 
that  Mark  orally  translated  Peter's  Aramaic  discourses  and 
preachings  into  Greek,  and  then  carefully  wrote  down  what  he  had 
orally  said.  Thirdly,  as  to  the  word  ifivrjfioveva-ev.  What  is  its 
exact  meaning?  Who  is  its  subject?  Some  have  rendered  'all 
that  he  (Peter)  mentioned,'  but  more  probably  'all  that  he  (Mark) 
repeated  (from  memory)'  is  meant.  The  word  may  also  mean 
'  remembered,'  and  in  that  case  too  either  Peter  or  Mark  may  be 
its  subject.  The  same  doubt  exists  about  d-rre/ivrj/iovevaev  a  little 
further  down.  That  word  is  probably  to  be  translated  'as  he 
(Mark)  exactly  repeated  them  from  memory.'  ,  Peter  spoke  in 
Aramaic ;  Mark  translated  orally,  and  then,  later  on,  wrote  down, 
as  accurately  as  he  could,  the  discourses  which  he  remembered, 
and  had  himself  verbally  delivered.  Another  important  detail  is 
the  phrase  '  not,  however,  in  order,'  ov  fievToi  rd^ei,.  Does  this 
refer  to  chronology  ?  More  probably  it  refers  to  what  Loisy  calls 
'  la  bonne  distribution  des  matiferes.'  Perhaps  the  Elder  thought 
that  Matthew  arranged  his  material  better  than  Mark.  'After- 
wards, as  I  have  said,  he  followed  Peter.'  What  does  '  afterwards' 
mean?  Taken  in  connection  with  'as  I  have  said'  it  probably 
means  that  Papias  had  elsewhere  remarked  that  Mark  had 
'followed'  Paul,  and  now  he  tells  us  that  'later  on'  he  became 
the  follower  and  interpreter  of  Peter.  Lastly,  what  is  the  meaning 
of  'some  particulars,  matters  or  things'  (ewa)?  We  must  not 
apparently  suppose  that  this  word  evia  ('some  things')  implies  that 
to  Papias  only  a  part  of  the  Gospel  of  Mai-k  goes  back  to  Mark. 
Papias  is  alluding  to  our  Gospel  and  not  to  a  part  of  it.     The 


INTRODUCTION  xxvii 

'some  things'  simply  refer  to  the  separate  particular  teachings 
and  preachings  of  Peter  according  as  Mark  remembered  them. 

The  value  of  the  statement  of  Papias  woald  be  increased  if  we 
knew  more  about  Papias's  authority,  John  the  Elder.  But  from 
another  fragment  of  Papias,  quoted  by  Eusebius,  it  is  practically 
certain  that  John  the  Elder  was  not  the  apostle  John,  and  indeed 
was  probably  not  an  apostle  at  all  or  an  immediate  disciple  of 
Jesus.  'If,'  says  Papias,  'anyone  arrived  who  had  followed  the 
Men  of  Old  Time  (the  Elders)  {Trapt^KoXovdrjKm  rt?  toi9  vpea- 
^vripoi<i),  I  enquired  as  to  their  words :  what  Andrew  or  what 
Peter  said  or  Philip  or  Thomas  or  James  or  John  or  Matthew  or 
any  other  of  the  disciples  of  the  Lord,  or  what  Aristion  or  John 
the  Elder  [the  disciples  of  the  Lord]  say.'  Here  clearly  the 
apostle  John  and  John  the  Elder  are  distinguished  from  each 
other,  while  the  bracketed  words  are  in  all  probability  a  gloss.  It 
is  not  even  certain  that  Papias  had  spoken  directly  with  John  the 
Elder :  he  may  only  have  spoken  with  someone  who  had  '  followed ' 
him.  Under  these  circumstances  the  statement  of  Papias  simply 
comes  to  this  :  that  a  disciple  of  the  disciples  told  him  a  tradition 
about  the  origin  and  authorship  of  the  Gospel  of  Mark.  Thus, 
as  Loisy  justly  observes,  what  Papias,  on  the  authority  of  John  the 
Elder,  says  of  Mark  and  of  Matthew,  has  not  a  strictly  historical 
character,  and  one  has  even  the  right  to  ask  if  his  statements  are 
not  semi-conjectures, '  compl6tant  des  demi-renseignements,'  about 
books  already  in  credit,  which  needed  to  be  covered  with  an 
important  name  in  order  to  maintain  the  authority  they  had 
acquired,  at  a  time  when  nobody  quite  knew  how  they  had  acquired 
it  {E.  S.  I.  p.  24). 

It  is  necessary  to  test  the  assertions  of  John  the  Elder  by  an 
examination  of  the  Gospel  itself  and  by  such  other  evidence  as 
may  be  available.  The  connection  of  Mark  and  Peter  mentioned 
in  the  so-called  first  Epistle  of  Peter  is  of  little  importance.  The 
Epistle  is  in  all  probability  not  authentic,  and  was  written  after 
the  Gospel.  Perhaps  even  the  very  mention  of  Mark's  name  in 
that  Epistle  is  not  without  connection  with  the  attribution  of  the 
Gospel  to  a  disciple  of  Peter.  '  Ce  serait  une  mention  interess^e, 
com  me  le  dire  de  Jean  I'Ancien'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  113).  In  any  case 
the  Mark  who  was  Peter's  disciple  can  hardly  have  been  the  Mark 
who  was  the  companion  of  Paul. 

§  5.     The  relation  of  Peter  to  the  Gospel  of  Mark. 

If  we  test  and  compare  the  Gospel  of  Mark  as  we  now  possess 
it  with  the  statement  of  Papias,  there  are  various  questions  to  be 
asked:    Does  the   Gospel  give   the  impression  of  being  in  its 


xxviii  INTRODUCTION 

entirety  the  work  of  a  disciple  of  Peter  ?  Or,  indeed,  does  it 
even  give  the  impression  of  being  the  literary  precipitate  of 
Peter's  discourses?  Is  it  not  rather  composite,  either  m  the 
sense  that  one  person  did  not  write  it  all  in  the  form  m  which 
we  now  possess  it,  or  in  the  sense  that  written  sources  were  used 
by  its  author  and  incorporated  into  his  work,  or  in  both  senses  at 
once  ?  Lastly,  is  Papias  right  in  saying  of  our  Gospel  that  it 
lacks  Ta^i<s,  'order,  arrangement'? 

As  regards  the  last  question,  we  have  seen  that  ra^ts  ('  order') 
to  John  and  Papias  probably  meant  not  chronological  order,  but 
the  right  arrangement  of  material  and  discourses.  '  Jean  pouvait 
trouver,  et  il  trouvait  sans  doute,  que  Marc  avait  moins  d'ordre 
que  Matthieu'  (E.  S.  I.  p.  26).  Nevertheless  it  has  to  be  admitted 
that,  even  so,  the  statement  of  John  is  rather  surprising,  for,  as 
Loisy  observes,  'les  morceaux  de  Marc'  are  not  'des  cat&heses 
mises  bout  k  bout.'  Mark  may  have  Petrine  material,  but  in  no 
sense  can  it  be  regarded,  so  far  as  order  is  concerned,  as  a  mere 
collection  of  Peter's  sermons  and  teachings  and  discourses.  Prof 
Bacon  says  that  the  tradition  which  Papias  records  'is  warmly 
apologetic  in  purpose,  and  aims  to  show  that  Mark,  although  not 
agreeing  with  Matthew  in  the  "order,"  nevertheless  "made  no 
mistake,  while  he  thus  wrote  down  some  things  as  he  remembered 
them ;  his  one  care  was  neither  to  omit  anything  that  he  had 
heard  or  to  set  down  any  false  statement  therein'"  (Bacon, 
Beginnings  of  Gospel  Story,  1909,  p.  xx.). 

The  other  questions  involve  a  discussion  of  the  substance 
and  the  details  of  the  entire  Gospel,  and  cannot  be  profitably 
examined  in  a  brief  Introduction  of  the  kind  suitable  to  this 
particular  book.  The  great  authorities  are  by  no  means  unani- 
mous in  their  answers.  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  following  such 
scholars  as  Loisy,  Wellhausen,  Bacon  and  many  others,  who, 
differing  in  many  points,  agree  in  this,  I  cannot  regard  the 
Gospel  of  Mark  as  being  in  its  entirety  the  work  of  a  disciple  of 
Peter.  It  is,  as  Loisy  says,  not  '  la  transcription  d'un  t^moignage 
original  et  direct  touchant  I'enseignement  et  la  carriere  de  j^sus.' 
It  is  not  the  work  of  a  man  '  sp^cialement  attache  a  Pierre,  et 
qui  tiendrait  de  I'apStre  meme  ce  qu'il  raconte  k  son  sujet' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  25).  It  is  not  the  work  of  a  man  who  was  careful  to 
collect  the  sure  evidence  of  those  who  had  seen  and  heard  Jesus, 
and  who  could  have  known  the  circumstances  of  his  death,  but  it 
is  rather  an  anonymous  compilation,  a  more  or  less  heterogeneous 
residuum  of  the  historic  tradition  of  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus, 
and  of  the  interpretations,  corrections,  and  additions  which  the 
labours  of  early  Christian  thought  had  introduced  into  that  tradi- 
tion {E.  S.  1.  p.  112). 


INTRODUCTION  xxix 

Nevertheless  it  may  be  fairly  safely  assumed  that  some  of 
Mark,  or  some  of  Mark's  material,  goes  back  to,  or  is  based  upon, 
the  reminiscences  and  statements  of  Peter.  Over  and  above  the 
tradition  to  this  effect,  there  are  some  positive  arguments  to  be 
drawn  from  the  Gospel  itself.  These  will  be  noticed  in  their  place. 
The  opening  scenes  of  the  Galilsean  ministry  are  located  in  Peter's 
home  :  the  Gospel  begins  to  be  detailed  where  Peter  had  personal 
knowledge.  The  story  of  Peter's  denial  must,  it  is  argued,  be  due 
to  him  and  him  alone :  would  tradition  have  invented  a  story  so 
damaging  to  the  reputation  of  the  great  apostle  ? 

Scholars  vary  in  their  opinion  as  to  the  amount  of  the  'Petrine' 
material  in  Mark.  For  example,  Dr  Carpenter  accepts  the  tradi- 
tional view  to  a  considerable  extent.  '  How  Peter's  reminiscences,' 
he  says,  'were  shaped  into  our  Mark  we  cannot  tell.'  But  he 
thinks  that  '  at  any  rate  it  remains  probable  that  the  main  facts 
of  our  second  Gospel  were  derived  from  Peter ;  the  baptism,  the 
ministry  in  Capernaum  and  on  the  lake,  the  choice  of  the  disciples, 
the  enlarging  work,  the  opposition  and  the  conflict,  the  confession 
of  the  Messiahship,  the  journey  to  Jerusalem,  the  entry  into  the 
capital,  the  last  days  of  gathering  danger,  the  fatal  night  of  anguish 
and  desertion — of  all  these  he  may  have  spoken.  The  leading 
outlines  of  the  immortal  story  are  drawn  from  the  life.  Here 
Jesus  thinks,  prays,  speaks,  feels,  acts,  as  a  man'  {First  Three 
Gospels,  p.  231).  The  many  graphic  touches  which  we  shall 
frequently  notice  in  Mark  bespeak,  to  many  scholars,  the  eye- 
witness. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  seems  to  be  much  in  the  Gospel,  as 
we  now  have  it,  which  cannot  proceed  from  Peter,  just  as,  if  Peter 
had  been  its  main  source,  many  things  would  probably  be  different 
from  what  we  now  find  and  have. 

To  begin  with,  if  the  Gospel  were  the  work  of  a  disciple  of 
Peter,  one  would  suppose  that  we  should  have  heard  somewhat 
more  about  him  and  perhaps  even  that  the  place  assigned  to 
him  would  be  other  than  what  it  is.  Or  must  we  say  that  Peter 
was  very  modest,  and  kept  his  own  relations  with  Jesus  in  the 
background  ?  Julicher  indeed  says :  '  Dass  Petrus  in  unserem 
Evangelium  besonders  hervortritt,  wird  nicht  zu  leugnen  sein' 
(Einleitung,  p.  276).  But  it  is  dubious  whether  the  mention  of 
Peter  in  x.  28  and  xi.  2 1  means  very  much,  even  though  Matthew 
in  his  parallel  to  xi.  21  has  the  disciples  generally,  and  not  Peter. 
Julicher  seems  to  think  it  very  significant  that  in  xvi.  7  Peter  is 
specially  singled  out  for  mention  {cp.  xiv.  29).  As  against  such 
arguments  we  have  the  arguments  of  Bacon,  who  points  out  that 
the  first  trace  of  an  individual  rSle  for  Peter  is  the  rebuke 
viii.  29-33.     'Thereafter  he  appears  in  ix.  S,  x.  28,  xi    21,  xiv. 


XXX  INTRODUCTION 

29-37,  66-72.  With  the  single  exception  of  xi.  21  he  appears 
always  as  the  object  of  rebuke  and  correction.'  The  American 
professor  goes  even  so  far  as  to  say:  '  Sight  by  hypnotic  suggestion 
has  few  more  curious  illustrations  than  the  discovery  by  writers 
under  the  spell  of  the  Papias  tradition  of  traces  in  Mark  of  special 
regard  for  Peter!  How  different  in  this  respect  is  our  Firet 
Gospel'  It  does  really  seem  the  case  as  regards  Peter  that  in 
Mark  we  hear  comparatively  little  about  him;  and  moreover— 
a  very  important  point — there  is  a  tendency  (unlike  Matthew)  to 
depreciate  (in  a  Pauline  manner)  the  intelligence  and,  to  some 
extent,  the  position,  of  all  the  Galilsean  apostles,  including  Peter 
(cp.  Bacon,  op.  cit.  pp.  xxiv.-xxvii.).  If  the  author  of  Mark  had 
'followed'  Peter,  might  we  not  assume  that  his  Gospel  would  have 
been  longer.  Wellhausen  observes  that  the  traditional  material 
which  Mark  reduces  to  writing  is  'comparatively  rich  for  Jerusalem, 
but  poor  for  Galilee.'  Would  this  be  so  if  this  tradition  went  back 
to  the  apostles  ?  '  It  would  rather  seem  as  if  the  narrative  tradi- 
tion in  Mark  did  not  mainly  proceed  from  the  intimate  friends 
of  Jesus.'  'It  has  for  the  most  part  a  somewhat  rough  popular 
manner.  In  the  form  in  which  we  now  possess  it,  this  tradition 
must  have  passed  through  many  people's  mouths  to  have  reached 
its  present  rather  blunt  and  rough-hewn  shape'  {Einleitung ,  p.  53). 
Then,  again,  there  are  the  miracles.  Do  these  not  imply  and 
require  a  certain  time  and  growth,  a  certain  amount  of  transmission 
or  development  from  mouth  to  mouth  ?  Thus,  to  quote  Wellhausen 
again,  he  observes:  'Are  we  to  suppose  that  Peter  was  the  authority 
for  the  sudden  call  of  the  four  "fishers  of  men  "  ?  Did  he  testify  to 
the  walking  on  the  sea,  to  the  passing  of  the  evil  spirits  into  the 
swine,  the  healing  of  the  woman  with  an  issue  through  the  power 
of  Jesus's  dress,  or  the  cure  of  the  deaf  and  the  blind  by  spittle  ? 
And  why  are  we  not  told  more,  or  not  told  more  credible  things, 
about  the  intercourse  of  the  Master  with  his  disciples?'  (Einleittmg, 
p.  52).  But  other  scholars,  for  example  Renan,  would  not  hold 
that  the  miracles  prevent  us  from  accepting  the  view  that  Mark 
embodies  many  of  the  direct  recollections  of  Peter.  The  miracles, 
the  'materialistic  thaumaturgy,'  are,  he  thinks,  quite  in  keeping 
with  Peter's  disposition.  The  Gospel  of  Mark  is  '  une  biographie 
dcrite  avec  cr^dulite.'  The  miracles  are  no  proof  of  its  unhistoric 
character.  'Things  which  upset  us  in  the  highest  degree  were 
matters  of  everyday  occurrence  to  Jesus  and  his  disciples.  The 
Roman  world  even  more  than  the  Jewish  world  was  a  dupe  to 
these  illusions.  The  miracles  wrought  by  Vespasian  are  of  precisely 
the  same  type  as  those  of  Jesus  in  the  Gospel  of  Mark.... But  the 
characters  in  the  legend,  the  vagueness  of  the  circumstances,  the 
indistinct  softness  of  the  outlines  are  very  noticeable  in  Matthew 


INTRODUCTION  xxxi 

and  in  Luke.  In  Mark,  on  the  other  hand,  everything  is  vivid  and 
lifelike:  we  feel  that  we  are  in  the  presence  of  reminiscences'  {Les 
£!vangiles,  p.  1 18).     Thus  do  the  authorities  dififer ! 

There  are  indeed  two  or  three  strands  or  elements  in  the 
Gospel  of  Mark  as  we  now  possess  it.  And  it  may  be,  and  it  has 
been  argued,  that  the  very  co-existence  of  these  different  strands 
is  a  proof  for  the  historical  character  of  one  of  them.  Mark  has 
not  produced  a  consistent  picture  of  Jesus.  All  the  more  proof 
that  some  of  the  traits  of  this  inconsistent  picture  were  drawn  or 
taken  from  the  life.  This  seems  a  good  argument  up  to  a  point. 
But  it  is  not  a  good  argument  for  the  theory  that  Mark  as  a  whole 
is  the  written  precipitate  of  the  discourses  of  Peter.  Underneath 
the  real  or  apparent  freshness  and  immediateness  of  the  narrative — 
or  shall  we  rather  say  often  encompassing  and  modifying  and  mis- 
interpreting it  ? — there  can  be  found  the  dogmatic  theories  of  the 
theologian.  These  theories  we  shall  hear  of  in  the  course  of  the 
commentary.  Mark's  object  is  to  prove  that  Jesus  is  the  divine 
Messiah,  the  Son  of  God.  But  if,  in  spite  of  this  conception  of  his 
hero,  a  simpler,  and  more  human  figure  can  nevertheless  well  be 
discerned  beneath  all  later  theological  overwrappings  in  the  pages 
of  Mark,  are  not  many  critics  right  in  regarding  this  as  a  tre- 
jnendously  powerful  argument  for  the  accuracy  and  primitiveness 
of  the  tradition,  which,  in  spite  of  the  later  accretions  and  develop- 
ments, still  keeps  its  original  character  ?  Has  not  Mark  reported 
many  things  faithfully?  And  of  these  many  things  must  not 
Peter  be  the  ultimate  source  and  authority?  Harnack,  at  any 
rate,  seems  to  go  too  far  when  he  says  (Lukas  der  Arzt,  p.  86,  n.  i) 
that  Mark  either  almost  made  of  Jesus  a  divine  spectre  (nahezu 
ein  gottliches  Oespenst)  or  already  found  such  a  conception  existing. 
A  vehement  and  learned  advocate  for  the  faithfulness  of  Mark  as 
an  incorporator  of  true  historical  tradition  is  Professor  Burkitt, 
whose  lectures  on  'the  Gospel  history  and  its  transmission'  are 
delightful  and  easy  reading.  The  third  lecture  deals  with,  and 
eloquently  pleads  for,  the  great  historical  value  of  Mark. 


§  6.    Mark  and  Paul. 

"We  have  seen  that,  according  to  Papias,  the  author  of  the 
second  Gospel,  whose  name  was  Mark,  was  not  only  a  '  follower ' 
of  Peter,  but  also  a  'follower'  of  Paul.  Putting  aside  the  question 
of  detail — whether,  that  is,  the  Mark  alluded  to  in  certain  epistles 

attributed  to  Paul  and  in  the  Acts  was  the  writer  of  the  Gospel 

there   is   the   further,  larger  and   far   more   important  question 
whether  the  Gospel  of  Mark,  as  we  have  it  now,  shows  traces  of 


xxxii  INTRODUCTION 

Pauline  doctrine  and  Pauline  views,  whether,  though  it  includes 
many  genuine  sayings  of  Jesus,  and  much   historic  information 
about  the  last  year  of  his  life,  it  puts  these  sayings  and  informa-  - 
tion  in  a  Pauline  setting,  and  in  so  doing  to  some  extent  changes, 
modifies  and  adds  to  them  ? 

This  larger  question  will  often  be  alluded  to  in  the  commentary. 
The  authorities  greatly  differ;  some  strongly  denying,  some  strongly 
emphasizing,  the  Pauline  character  of  Mark.  For  myself,  I  am 
inclined  to  agree  with  Bacon  and  Loisy,  and  to  accept  Mark's 
Paulinism — within  certain  limits.  How  far  this  Paulinism  may 
cause  us  to  suspect  the  historic  accuracy  of  certain  words  and 
phrases  which  are  put  in  Jesus's  mouth  is  a  delicate  and  difficult 
question  which  will  occasionally  be  alluded  to  in  the  commentary. 
The  measure  and  kind  of  the  Paulinism,  which  Loisy,  not,  as  I 
think,  improperly  attributes  to  Mark,  are  put  forth  by  the  French 
commentator  in  a  paragraph  of  his  Introduction  which  I  will  here 
translate. 

'Mark  may  have  been  a  disciple,  he  was  certainly  a  great 
admirer,  or  rather  a  warm  partisan,  of  Paul.  His  Gospel  is  a 
deliberate  Pauline  interpretation  of  the  primitive  tradition.  His 
Paulinism  is  not  confined  to  certain  expressions,  to  certain  scraps 
of  phrase  or  doctrine  which  he  might  have  borrowed  from  Paul. 
It  rather  consists  in  the  general  intention,  the  spirit,  the  dominat- 
ing ideas,  and  in  the  most  characteristic  elements  of  his  book.  It 
is  significant  that  Jesus  in  x.  45  declares  that  he  came  to  give  his 
life  as  a  ransom  for  many.  But  it  is  more  significant  still  that  the 
story  of  the  Last  Supper  has  become  the  story  of  the  institution  of 
the  Eucharist  by  means  of  the  introduction  of  formulae  which  are 
directly  inspired  by  the  Pauline  conception  of  the  Eucharist — a 
conception  which  itself  depends  on  the  Pauline  theory  of  redemp- 
tion. What  is  said  (iv.  10,  il)  of  the  divine  and  intentional 
blinding  of  the  Jews  through  the  parables  is  related  to  the  ideas 
of  Paul  on  predestination,  and  to  the  experiences  of  Paul's  ministry 
both  inside  and  outside  Israel.  Indeed  the  influence  of  Paul,  and 
even  a  certain  keenness  for  him  personally,  a  desire  to  apologize 
for  his  conduct  and  action,  make  themselves  constantly  a  little 
felt,  whether,  for  example,  in  the  writer's  attitude  towards  t>he  Jews, 
or  in  his  method  of  judging  and  representing  the  characters  of  the 
Galilsean  apostles  who  in  one  place  are  almost  identified  with  the 
Jews  (viii.  17, 18).  The  Sabbath  stories  seem  to  point  towards  the 
abrogation  of  the  Sabbath  for  Christians ;  in  connection  with  th^ 
saying  on  true  defilement,  the  Evangelist  definitely  argues — and 
in  the  very  spirit  of  Paul — against  the  observances  of  the  Law. 
It  is  in  Paul's  interest  that  the  story  of  the  strange  exorcist  is 
related  or  perhaps  invented ;  it  is  in  order  to  reserve  for  Paul  one 


INTEODUOTION  xxxiii 

of  the  first  places  in  the  KiDgdom  of  God  that  Jesus  refuses  to 
grant  the  request  of  the  sons  of  Zebedee  (see  the  commentary, 
p.  257).  The  Evangelist  is  not  however  more  hostile  to  Peter  and 
the  other  apostles  than  is  Paul  himself:  he  only  permits  himself 
to  judge  them,  and  not  to  admire  or  approve  of  them  without 
qualifications.  He  does  not  enter  into  the  details  (les  sp6cialiUs) — 
one  might  say  the  subtleties — of  the  Pauline  theology,  whether 
because  of  a  certain  sense  of  restraint  which  the  story  of  the  history 
of  Jesus  imposed  upon  the  narrator,  or  because  his  cast  of  mind 
inclined  him  to  general  and  simple  ideas,  or  because  the  teaching 
of  Paul  only  came  to  him  indirectly  through  an  intermediary,  and 
he  himself  had  never  heard  the  apostle  or  read  his  writings' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  1 16).  There  may  be  some  exaggeration  in  this  estimate 
of  Loisy's,  but  I  think  that  there  is  also  much  truth. 


§  7.     The  sources  of  Mark. 

How  then  are  the  various  elements  in  Mark,  including  also 
certain  unevennesses,  doublets,  and  additions,  to  be  accounted  for  ? 
There  are  certain  scholars  who  hold  that  (with  the  exception  of 
chapter  xiii.)  there  is  little  or  nothing  behind  our  Mark  other  than 
oral  tradition.  (Whether  Mark  was  originally  written  in  Aramaic 
is  a  separate  question  which  need  not  concern  us  here.)  Mark  was 
known  to  and  used  by  Matthew  and  Luke  very  much  in  the  form 
we  know  and  have  him  now,  and  a  shorter  edition  of  his  book,  an 
Urmarcus,  never  existed.  Or,  again,  it  has  been  held  that,  though 
behind  our  Mark  there  is  nothing  but  oral  tradition,  yet  both  in 
Aramaic  and  in  Greek  there  was  more  than  one  '  edition '  of  the 
book.  The  work  as  we  have  it  now  has  gone  through  expansions 
and  additions.  The  difference  between  these  two  views  is  not 
of  very  great  importance  when  they  are  both  contrasted  with  a 
third  view  to  which,  after  much  hesitation,  I  now  incline.  That 
third  view  (which  may  or  may  not  be  combined  with  the  second) 
is  that  our  Gospel  of  Mark  is  a  compilation,  that  Mark  had  written 
sources,  which  have  not  survived.  These  written  sources  may  have 
been  originally  written  in  Aramaic,  while  Mark  itself  may  have 
been  written  from  the  outset  in  Greek.  And  these  sources,  or  some 
of  them,  may  conceivably  have  been  also  known  to  Matthew  and 
to  Luke.  This  third  view  is  maintained  by  Loisy  and  by  Bacon 
as  well  as  by  other  scholars.  It  is,  especially  in  one  important 
part  of  it,  strongly  denied  by  Wellhausen,  while  other  scholars  are 
less  definite  one  way  or  the  other. 


xxxiv  INTRODUCTION 


§  8.     The  supposed  narrative  source. 

The  first  of  these  hypothetical  sources  was,  it  is  supposed,  a 
narrative  of  the  ministry  and  death  of  Jesus.  It  may  have  included 
in  a  shorter  form  a  large  number,  in  fact  the  large  majority,  of  the 
stories  which  the  second  Gospel  now  contains.  Thus  Loisy  thinks 
that  this  narrative  source  may  have  embraced,  after  a  brief  men- 
tion of  John  the  Baptist,  the  baptism  of  Jesus  and  his  return  to 
Galilee, 

(i)  The  call  of  the  first  disciples. 

(2)  The  incidents  of  the  first  Sabbath  at  Capernaum,  except, 
probably,  the  story  of  the  man  with  the  unclean  spirit  (L  23-27). 

(3)  The  basis  (lefond)  of  the  story  of  the  paralyzed  man, 

(4)  Perhaps  the  call  of  Levi. 

(5)  The  action  taken  by  Jesus's  relations. 

(6)  The  basis  probably  of  the  story  of  the  man  with  the 
unclean  spirit  among  the  Gadarenes. 

(7)  The  basis  probably  of  the  story  of  the  daughter  of  Jairus. 

(8)  The  story  of  the  preaching  of  Jesus  at  Nazareth. 

(9)  General  indications  about  the  despatch  of  the  disciples  and 
their  return. 

(10)  The  journey  to  Gennesareth. 

(i  i)  The  journey  to  the  district  of  Tyre. 

(12)  Perhaps  the  story  of  the  Canaanite  woman. 

(13)  The  confession  of  Peter  with  the  promise  of  the  near 
Parousia  and  the  reflections  on  the  coming  of  Elijah. 

(14)  Perhaps  the  healing  of  the  epileptic  child. 

(15)  The  return  to  Capernaum,  and 

(16)  Perhaps  the  story  of  the  children  brought  to  Jesus  for  his 
blessing. 

(17)  The  departure  for  Judaea,  and 

(18)  Perhaps  the  story  of  the  rich  young  man. 

(19)  The  journey  to  Jerusalem. 

(20)  Perhaps  the  question  of  Peter  about  the  future  lot  of  the 
disciples,  and  the  promise  of  the  thrones. 

(21)  The  Messianic  entry  at  the  mount  of  Olives. 

(22)  The  expulsion  of  the  money-changers  from  the  Temple. 

(23)  The  question  of  the  priests  about  the  'authority'  with 
which  Jesus  is  endowed. 

(24)  The  question  of  the  Pharisees  about  the  tribute-money. 

(25)  Probably  also  the  question  of  the  Sadducees  about  the 
Resurrection. 


INTRODUCTION  xxxv 

(26)  The  saying  as  to  whose  son  is  the  Messiah. 

(27)  The  story  of  the  woman  taken  in  adultery. 

(28)  Perhaps  the  story  of  the  widow's  mite. 

(29)  A  saying  as  to  the  destruction  of  the  Temple. 

(30)  The  basis  of  the  narratives  about 

(a)  The  betrayal  by  Judas. 

(b)  The  Last  Supper. 

(c)  The  night  at  Gethsemane. 

(d)  The  arrest. 

(e)  The  denial  of  Peter. 

(/)  The  trial  and  condemnation  of  Jesus  before  Pilate. 
(g)  The  mockery  scene  at  the  prsetorium. 
(h)  The  crucifixion  and  the  death. 

It  is  this  narrative  source  which  may  have  supplied  the  basis 
for  what  John  the  Elder  was  reported  to  have  said  about  Mark 
and  Peter.  In  that  source  there  may  perhaps  be  heard  '  an  echo 
of  apostolic  evidence  and  specially  of  the  reminiscences  of  Peter. 
A  special  and  direct  relation  of  the  author  of  this  source  with 
Peter  is  possible  and  even  probable,  though  by  no  means  necessary. 
A  story  such  as  Peter's  denial  goes  back  to  Peter  and  could  only 
have  got  into  the  tradition  through  him.  But  the  man  who  first 
wrote  the  story  down  may  have  had  it  from  intermediaries:  still 
more  therefore  could  other  stories  such  as  the  confession  of  Peter 
and  the  arrest  have  been  narrated  to  him  by  others.  He  may 
have  drawn  from  the  common  memories  of  the  Galilaean  apostles 
just  as  well  as  from  one  individual.  But  as  this  first  writer  may 
well  have  had  relations  with  Peter,  and  as  the  origin  of  the  tradi- 
tion about  the  origin  of  the  second  Gospel  is  thus  more  easily 
explained,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  us  from  assuming  that  a 
disciple  of  Peter  collected  this  series  of  reminiscences  from  the 
mouth  of  the  apostle  himself.  In  any  case  it  is  certain  that  Peter 
played  a  preponderant  part  in  the  formation  of  the  traditional 
apostolic  teaching  (la  caUchese  apostoUque),  and  that  consequently 
the  fundamental  traditions  at  least  of  the  Gospel  story  go  back 
to  and  proceed  from  him '  (E.  S.  i.  p.  1 14). 

This  narrative  source,  which  Loisy  further  assumes  to  have 
had  certain  accretions  (such  as  the  fuller  story  of  the  baptism,  the 
story  of  the  temptation,  the  miraculous  feeding,  and  the  trans- 
figuration) added  to  it  before  it  came  into  the  hands  of  the  author 
of  our  Mark,  may  have  been  written  in  Jerusalem  or  in  Judsea, 
some  ten  to  twenty  years  before  the  second  Gospel — say  between 
50  and  60  A.D.  Thus  for  the  basis  of  the  Gospel  story,  the  evidence 
would  go  back  very  closely  to  the  events  which  are  recorded. 

c  2 


xxxvi  INTRODUCTION 

§  9.     The  '  speech '  or  '  sayings '  document  known  as  Q. 
The  relation  of  Mark  to  this  source. 

Was  the  narrative  source  which  has  here  been  assumed  the 
only  written  source  which  the  author  of  our  Mark  knew  and  used? 
Here  we  come  to  a  disputed  and  very  important  question.  It  is 
very  important  for  the  following  reason. 

The  Gospels  of  Matthew  and  Luke,  both  larger  than  Mark,  are 
both,  as  wholes,  undoubtedly  later  than  Mark,  and  both  undoubtedly 
used  Mark  as  one  of  their  sources.  That  Mark  is  the  oldest  of  the 
Gospels,  and  that  Matthew  and  Luke  made  use  of  him,  is  one  of 
the  most  certain  and  assured  results  of  the  prolonged,  minute  and 
exhaustive  investigation  by  scholars  into  the  Gospel  narratives 
and  texts.  It  may  be  said  that,  practically  speaking,  everybody 
is  agreed  upon  this  subject.  Between  them,  Matthew  and  Luke 
take  up  and  use  almost  the  whole  of  Mark's  verses  from  i.  i  to 
xvi.  8.  But  in  addition  to  what  they  borrow  and  adapt  from 
Mark,  Matthew  and  Luke  have  a  great  deal — especially  of  discourse 
by  Jesus — which  is  not  found  in  Mark.  Of  this  extra  matter,  a 
considerable  part  is  common  (with  textual  variations)  to  them 
both,  while  some  is  peculiar  to  each.  As  it  is  unlikely  either 
that  Matthew  used  Luke,  or  that  Luke  used  Matthew,  for  this  and 
other  reasons  it  is  generally  acknowledged  that  what  is  common 
to  both  Matthew  and  Luke,  together  perhaps  with  some  of  that 
which  is  special  to  each,  was  taken  from  some  source  or  sources 
which  they  both  drew  upon  and  used.  The  material,  at  any  rate, 
not  in  Mark,  and  common  to  both  Matthew  and  Luke,  is  usually 
supposed  to  be  drawn  from  one  particular  source,  which  is  generally 
known  and  designated  under  the  title  of  Q  (Q  being  the  first  letter 
of  the  German  word  Quelle,  'a  well,  a  source').  This  common 
material  includes  some  most  important  sayings  of  Jesus;  for 
instance,  it  includes  a  large  portion  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
and  such  an  immensely  important  saying  as  Matt.  xi.  25-27 
(Luke  X.  21,  22).  The  date  and  origin  of  this  source  become 
therefore  a  matter  of  the  first  importance.  The  material  common 
to  both  Matthew  and  Luke,  which  in  all  probability  was  drawn 
from  this  source,  enables  us  to  make  some  conjectures  about  its 
nature.  It  was  mainly  a  collection  of  the  sayings  of  Jesus :  it 
doubtless  contained  a  few  brief  narratives,  but  these  nai-ratives 
were  included  as  settings  and  occasions  for  sayings  and  discourses' 
rather  than  for  their  own  sake:  it  closed  apparently  before  the 
story  of  the  Passion. 

A  further  observation  of  great  importance  about  this  source 
is — and  here  we  come  to  the  crucial  point — that  over  and  above 


INTRODUCTION  xxxvii 

material  which  is  common  to  both  Matthew  and  Luke,  and  is  not 
found  in  Mark,  it  must  also  have  contained  material  which  is  con- 
tained in  Mark.  We  find,  for  instance,  in  Luke  the  same  sayings 
recounted  twice  over,  once,  as  it  is  easy  to  see,  from  Mark,  and  once 
from  the  extra  source  (Q). 

What,  then,  is  the  deduction  ?  There  are  three  alternatives. 
The  passages  which  are  common  to  Mark  and  the  extra  source  may 
be  due  to  both  having  drawn  from  the  same  common  oral  tradition; 
or  again  they  may  be  due  to  the  extra  source  (Q)  having  borrowed 
from  (and  adapted)  Mark ;  and,  lastly,  they  may  be  due  to  Mark 
having  known  and  borrowed  from  (and  adapted)  the  extra  source 
(Q).  It  may  be  said  at  once  that  each  of  these  three  hypotheses 
has  its  own  special  difficulties.  But  if  we  put  the  first  hypothesis 
on  one  side,  the  difference  between  the  second  and  third  in  signifi- 
cance becomes  at  once  apparent.  For  if  Q  borrowed  from  Mark, 
then  Q,  including  perhaps  all  those  important  sections  which  are 
common  to  Matthew  and  Luke,  but  are  not  found  in  Mark,  is 
later  than  Mark,  i.e.  it  was  written  down  after  70  A.D.  But  if 
Mark  borrowed  from  Q,  then  Q,  including  presumably  the  sections 
which  are  not  found  in  Mark,  but  are  common  to  Matthew  and 
Luke,  is  earlier  than  Mark;  i.e.  Q  was  written  down  before  70  A.D., 
and  may  be,  so  far  as  Mark  is  concerned,  indefinitely  earlier.  In 
that  case  the  authenticity  of  the  words  attributed  to  Jesus  by  Q 
becomes  the  more  likely. 

The  second  hypothesis — that  Q  borrowed  from  Mark — is  main- 
tained by  Wellhausen  with  great  brilliancy  and  force ;  the  third 
hypothesis,  within  varying  limits,  is  strongly  upheld  by  Loisy, 
Bousset,  B.  Weiss,  Bacon  and  several  other  scholars. 

After  considerable  hesitation  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion 
that,  within  certain  limitations  (to  be  shortly  alluded  to),  the 
third  hypothesis  is  the  true  one.  Q,  at  any  rate  in  its  oldest 
form  or  edition,  is  older  than  Mark. 

More  must  be  said  of  this  source  in  the  paragraphs  on  Matthew 
and  Luke.  Meanwhile  let  me  add  that  Loisy  not  unreasonably 
holds  that  for  this  source  too — Q,  the  Logia,  le  recueil  de  sentences 
— Peter  must  also  have  been  an  authority.  Like  the  narrative 
source,  the  'sayings'  source  was  not  formed  without  him.  The 
date  of  both  sources  may  be  about  the  same ;  their  place  of  origin 
(Jerusalem),  their  original  language  (Aramaic),  may  also  be  the 
same.  And  the  spirit  of  the  two  sources,  '  so  far  as  one  can  judge, 
was  about  the  same.  Both  expressed  the  recollections  and  the 
faith  of  the  earliest  Christian  community  without  any  influence  of 
Pauline  theology :  the  Galilsean  apostles  appeared  in  both  as  the 
authorized  witnesses  of  the  life  and  the  teaching  of  Christ '  {E.  S. 
I.  p.  114). 


xxxviii  INTRODUCTION 

Loisy  suggests  that  the  following  bits  of  Mark  may  be  due 
toQ: 

(i)  The  summaiy  of  the  preaching  of  John. 

(2)  The  stories  about  the  Sabbath  (ii.  23-28,  iii.  1-6). 

(3)  The  dispute  about  Beelzebul. 

(4)  The  parables. 

(5)  The  saying  about  Jesus  eating  with  tax-collectors  and 
einners  (ii.  17). 

(6)  The  saying  about  fasting  (ii.  19,  20). 

(7)  The  saying  about  that  which  defiles  a  man.  ___ 

(8)  The  answer  to  those  who  asked  for  a  sign  (viii.  12). 

(9)  The  saying  about  the  leaven  of  the  Pharisees  (viiL  15). 

(10)  The  saying  about  the  renouncement  (viii.  35). 

(11)  The  teachings  given  at  the  last  stay  of  Jesus  at  Capernaum 

(ix.  33-So). 

(12)  The  saying  about  divorce. 

(13)  The  sayings  about  service  (x.  42-45). 

(14)  The  curt  summary  which  is  all  that  Mark  gives  of  the 
discourse  against  the  Pharisees  (xii.  38-40). 

(15)  Certain  bits  in  the  apocalyptic  discourse. 

It  will  be  noted  in  the  course  of  the  commentary  that  with 
regard  to  some  of  these  passages  the  supposed  ascription  to  Q  is 
-very  doubtful,  but  to  deny  this  ascription  for  all  of  them  seems  to 
me  now  more  doubtful  still.  After  B.  Weiss's  two  last  books  I 
think  that  the  trend  of  opinion  will  more  and  more  incline  to  the 
hypothesis  that,  in  some  form  of  it  or  other,  Mark  knew  Q  and 
used  it. 


§  10.    Wellhausen,  Julicher,  and  Harnack  on  Mark  and  Q. 

The  reasons  which  induce  Wellhausen  to  hold  that  Q  is  every- 
where later  than  Mark  are  largely,  though  not  exclusively,  due  to 
a  comparison  of  the  form  and  the  environment  of  certain  passages 
in  Mark,  parallels  to  which  are  also  found  in  Matthew  and  Luke 
and  were  presumably  borrowed  from  Q,  with  their  environment 
and  form  in  Luke  and  Matthew.  In  every  case  he  finds  reasons 
for  thinking  that  form  and  environment  in  Q  suggest  a  later  date 
for  Q.  Thus  there  are  some  nine  verses  in  Mark  which  are  parallel 
to  some  nine  verses  in  Matthew's  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (which 
occupies  107  verses  in  all).  Wellhausen  holds  that  the  originality 
in  the  case  of  each  of  these  nine  verses  is  on  the  side  of  Mark. 
And  so  on.  We  shall  have  occasion  to  notice  some  of  Wellhausen's 
arguments  about  such  parallel  passages,  together  with  those  of  his 


INTRODUCTION  xxxix 

opponents,  in  the  course  of  the  commentary.  But  in  addition  to 
these  comparisons  Wellhausen  has  general  reasons  as  well.  He 
holds,  for  instance,  that  the  general  religious  point  of  view  of  Q  is 
later  than  that  of  Mark.  Into  this  delicate  and  difficult  point  I 
cannot  enter  here :  it  will  be  incidentally  alluded  to  more  than 
once  in  the  commentary  upon  Matthew.  But  there  is  a  further 
argument  which  more  especially  concerns  Mark.  It  is  this.  The 
Gospel  according  to  Mark  is  much  the  shortest  of  the  Synoptics. 
Luke  is  a  little  longer  than  Matthew,  and  Mark  stands  to  Matthew 
in  the  proportion  of  two  to  three.  Mark  consists  of  stories  and 
incidents  in  the  life  of  Jesus,  together  with  some  specimens  of 
his  oral  teaching.  But  the  stories  occupy  a  far  bigger  space  than 
the  words.  Of  speeches  which  occupy  more  than  two  or  three 
continuous  verses,  or  which  do  not,  as  it  were,  form  part  of  the 
narratives  and  stories,  there  are  very  few.  They  certainly  do  not 
occupy  more  than  one-fifth  of  the  first  twelve  chapters.  Hence 
the  question  arises :  Did  the  author  of  the  Gospel  of  Mark  absorb 
and  reproduce  all  that  he  had  heard,  and  all  that  he  had  read  (if 
written  sources  were  known  to  him),  about  the  life  and  teaching 
of  Jesus  ?  It  is  not  so  much  in  connection  with  incidents  and 
stories  in  Jesus's  life  that  this  question  is  important ;  its  main 
importance  lies  in  connection  with  what  Jesus  said,  with  his 
speeches,  parables,  and  oral  teaching.  Of  these  there  is  a  great 
deal  in  Matthew  and  Luke  which  is  not  found  in  Mark.  Did  Mark 
know  of  the  existence  of  all  these  extra  speeches,  or  did  he  not  ? 
If  many  of  them  existed  in  Q,  and  if  Mark  knew  and  used  Q, 
why  did  he  omit  them  from  his  book  ?  On  the  fact  of  this 
omission,  which  one  must  agree  with  Jiilicher  in  regarding  as  very 
remarkable  (im  hochsten  Grade  merkwiirdig),  Wellhausen  naturally 
lays  stress.  For  he  holds  that  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  that 
Mark  deliberately  omitted  from  his  Gospel  many  sayings  and 
words  of  Jesus  which  nevertheless  were  known  to  him. 

'  Mark  indubitably  desired  to  record  the  whole  tradition — the 
words  of  Jesus  as  well  as  the  stories  about  his  life  and  death.  It 
cannot  possibly  be  allowed  that  he  did  not  include  all  that  was 
available  to  him,  or  that  he  left  out  what  had  already  been  written 
down  before  him.  He  was  in  no  wise  a  mere  maker  of  a  supple- 
ment. If,  without  and  against  his  intention,  a  few  things  escaped 
his  notice,  yet  the  gleaning  of  old  and  authentic  material  which 
he  left  over  for  others  cannot  have  been  much  richer  than  his  own 
harvest.  The  Sermon  on  the  Mount  is  not  only  unknown  to  him, 
but  entirely  contradicts  his  representation  of  Jesus's  Galilsean 
ministry '  {Einleitung,  p.  86). 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  there  is  some  force  in  Wellhausen's 
contentions.    Jiilicher,  who,  as  1  have  said,  admits  that  the  fact  of 


xl  INTRODUCTION 

the  omissions  is  remarkable,  also  attempts  to  explain  it.  And 
doubtless  his  explanations,  if  we  hold  that  the  arguments  which 
go  to  prove  Mark's  use  of  Q  are  too  strong  to  be  rejected,  must  be 
accepted  for  lack  of  better.  He  (like  other  scholars)  thinks  that 
we  must  take  into  grave  account  the  nature  and  object  of  Mark's 
work  and  book.  Mark's  great  object  was  to  show  that  Jesus  was 
the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  God.  Hence,  like  Paul,  he  does  not  care 
so  much  for  Jesus's  sayings  as  for  his  person,  his  Messiahship,  his 
relation  to  God.  He  desired  to  depict  the  life  and  Messianic 
character  of  Jesus  rather  than  his  teaching.  His  Gospel  was 
intended  for  the  use  of  missionaries  and  preachers.  To  convert 
the  heathen,  it  was  useful  for  the  proof  of  the  Messiahship  and  the 
superhuman  character  of  Jesus,  with  a  description  of  his  many 
miracles,  and  of  his  Passion  and  death,  to  be  in  the  hands  of  the 
preacher.  'On  the  other  hand  the  precepts  which  Jesus  had  given, 
his  teachings  about  prayer,  trust  in  God,  forgiveness  of  sin  and  so 
on — these  were  reserved  for  those  who  had  already  accepted  the 
new  faith '  {Einleitung,  p.  286).  In  another  connection  the  same 
author  observes  that  perhaps  Mark  (in  obedience  to  the  maxim 
contained  in  Matt.  vii.  6)  was  anxious  to  entrust  only  so  much 
of  the  holy  words  of  the  Master  to  the  publicity  of  a  Hellenistic 
world  as  it  must  needs  know  in  order  to  realize  his  greatness. 
We  can  scarcely  attach  much  cogency  to  this  suggestion  :  perhaps 
we  may  rather  accept  his  other  observation  that  the  only  tolerable 
explanation  which  he  can  think  of  for  the  smallness  of  space 
given  in  Mark  to  Jesus's  words  is  that  a  collection  of  that 
kind  {i.e.  Q)  was  already  in  the  hands  of  believers.  The  oldest 
edition  of  Q  is  thus  known  to  Mark,  but  because  it  exists,  he 
does  not  think  it  necessary  to  make  use  of  it  in  his  own  work. 
So  too  thought  Renan,  who  further  supposed  that  the  spirit  of 
Peter,  '  un  peu  etroit  et  sec,'  was  perhaps  the  cause  '  d'une  telle 
suppression.' 

But,  perhaps,  on  the  whole  the  least  unsatisfactory  explanation 
(for  one  can  hardly  call  it  more)  of  the  difficulty  is  that  the  Q 
which  was  known  to  Luke  and  Matthew  was  other  and  bigger  than 
the  Q  which  was  known  to  Mark.  In  other  words,  as  was  implied 
in  the  preceding  paragraph,  Q  went  through  several  expansions 
and  editions:  it  grew,  and  was  added  to  from  time  to  time.  We 
may  perhaps  assume,  in  the  words  of  Jiilicher,  '  a  gradual  ex- 
pansion and  growth  of  Q  from  some  isolated  series  of  sentences  to 
that  sort  of  half-Gospel,  in  which  we  can  first  trace  its  existence 
in  history '  ('  Ein  allmahliches  Anwachsen  von  Q  aus  losen 
Spruchreihen  zu  dem  Halbevangelium  als  das  es  dann  in  der 
Literaturgeschichte  auf  uns  stosst').  'Its  beginnings  would  go 
back  to  a  very  early  period,  long  before  Mark:  while,  later  on, 


INTRODUCTION  xli 

under  the  influence  of  Mark,  it  would  have  become  more  and  more 
rounded  off  and  completed '  {Einleitung,  p.  322).  It  is  difficult  to 
believe  that  if  Mark  had  known  of  such  a  saying  as  Matt.  xi.  27, 
he  would  have  not  taken  care  to  include  it  in  his  book.  What 
more  significant  evidence  and  proof  of  the  unique  relation  of  Jesus 
to  God? 

It  may  be  added  that  the  great  theologian  Harnack,  who  in 
1907  published  a  small  and  immensely  valuable  treatise  on  Q — 
the  apostolic  and  early  character  of  which  he  warmly  defends — 
then  held  that  the  verbal  parallels  between  Mark  and  Q  were  not 
due  to  either  having  borrowed  from  the  other.  Both  he  then  held 
were  independent  of  each  other,  though  Q  was  older  than  Mark. 
The  verbal  parallels  were  due  to  common  oral  tradition.  'No 
proof  can  be  given,'  said  the  great  Harnack  in  1907,  'of  any 
literary  relationship  between  the  two  works.  And  this  fact  is  an 
indication  that  we  must  not  date  Q  all  too  early :  for  had  Q  been 
already  long  in  circulation,  we  could  neither  understand  that  Mark 
did  not  know  it  nor  that  he  did  not  make  use  of  it,  even  though 
he  wrote  at  a  distance  from  Palestine '  (Spriiche  wnd  Reden  Jesu, 
p.  172).  Since  1907  Harnack  has  announced  that  B.  Weiss  has 
converted  him.  Mark  did  make  use  of  Q.  But,  so  far  as  I  am 
aware,  Harnack  has  not  given  his  explanation  why  the  use  of  Q 
made  by  Mark  was  so  exceedingly  small. 

Whether  Mark  had  any  other  written  sources  before  him 
besides  the  '  Petrine  narrative '  and  some  early  edition  of  Q  cannot 
be  ascertained.  It  is  not  impossible.  We  may  at  any  rate  assume 
with  some  certainty  a  special  and  probably  Jewish  source  for 
much  of  the  apocalyptic  oration  in  chapter  xiii. 


§  II.     Date  and  divisions  of  Mark. 

The  author  wrote  his  book,  as  we  have  already  indicated,  in  all 
probability  soon  after  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  in  70  A.D.  The  place 
where  the  book  was  written  is  generally  supposed  to  be  Kome, 
though  Wellhausen  on  this  point  too  mistrusts  the  tradition.  But 
at  any  rate,  as  Loisy  observes,  it  seems  impossible  that  the  author 
of  Mark  should  have  written  his  work  in  Palestine  or  in  a  locality 
where  'la  tradition  des  premiers  apdtres  et  des  disciples  imm^diats 
de  Je'sus  aurait  ^tt^  largement  representee.'  'This  circumstance 
does  not  exclude  Rome,  but  does  not  decisively  recommend  it ; 
nevertheless  the  presentation  of  Mark  by  the  side  of  more  complete 
Gospels,  or  the  probability  that  it  was  compiled  in  a  country  of 
Latin  speech  (though  its  use  of  Latin  words  is  not  a  decisive 
argument  seeing  that  Roman  rule  had  necessarily  introduced  many 


xlii  INTRODUCTION 

Latin  words  even  in  the  East),  can  be  invoked  in  support  of  the 
more  or  less  traditional  hypothesis.  Perhaps  even  it  is  due  to  its 
character  as  an  old  Roman  Gospel,  rather  than  to  the  origin  of  one 
of  its  sources,  that  the  book  owes  its  attribution  to  a  disciple  of 
Peter'  (E.S.i.j).  119). 

Mark  can  be  split  up  into  various  divisions  and  sub-divisions. 
"With  regard  to  these  divisions  and  sub-divisions  there  is  room  for 
some  diversity  of  opinion  among  different  scholars.  But  as  to  the 
main  breaks  and  pauses  there  can  be  little  doubt.  After  a  sort  of 
introduction  or  prologue  extending  over  the  first  13  or  15  verses 
of  his  first  chapter  there  comes  the  first  big  part,  containing  the 
record  (brief  and  fragmentary)  of  the  Galilsean  ministry.  This 
extends  down  to  vi.  13.  Then  from  vi.  14  to  the  end  of  chapter  x. 
extends  a  section  which  Wellhausen  divides  into  two  parts,  the 
first  of  which  (vi.  14-viii.  26)  he  entitles  'Jesus  unsettled  and 
wandering '  {Jesiis  auf  unsteter  Wandervng),  while  the  second,  fi-om 
viii.  27  to  the  end  of  x.,  he  calls  '  Jesus  on  the  way  to  Jerusalem.' 
Bacon  would  prefer  to  make  the  section  vi.  14-viii.  26  a  third 
division  of  a  big  Part  I.  extending  from  i.  i  to  x.  52.  The  rest 
of  the  book  from  xi.  to  the  end  clearly  falls  into  two  parts,  of 
which  the  first,  xi.-xiii.,  deals  with  the  entry  into,  and  the  teaching 
in  Jerusalem,  and  the  second,  xiv.  to  the  end,  with  the  Passion  and 
resurrection. 

Mark  has  a  very  clear  idea  of  the  course  and  issue  of  the 
ministry  of  Jesus  and  presents  us  with  a  clear  and  reasonable, 
and,  upon  the  whole,  an  assuredly  historic  picture.  There  can 
be  little  doubt  that  the  main  historic  outlines  of  the  brief  public 
career  of  Jesus  and  of  the  circumstances  of  his  death  are  to  be 
really  found  in  Mark,  and  are  only  to  be  found  there.  Problems 
indeed  there  are  which  the  Gospel  suggests  and  raises  in  plenty. 
They  will  meet  us  in  the  course  of  the  commentary.  But,  in 
spite  of  them,  we  are  enabled  to  get  from  Mark  a  sure  insight  into 
the  general  course  of  that  last  fateful  year  or  eighteen  months  of 
Jesus's  life,  and  also  into  some  main  elements  of  his  teaching  and 
character.  We  cannot  be  grateful  enough  to  the  author  of  this 
Gospel. 


§  12.     The  Oospel  of  Matthew:  its  relation  to  Mark. 

We  have  now  to  speak  of  the  Gospel  of  Matthew. 

It  has  already  been  said  that  almost  the  whole  of  Mark  is 
incorporated  in  Matthew,  who  also  to  a  very  considerable  extent 
follows  the  order  of  Mark's  narrative,  both  as  to  the  sequence  of 
the  stories  which  Mark  relates,  as  well  as  naturally  in  the  general 


INTRODUCTION  xliii 

outline  of  the  life.  In  Matthew,  as  in  Mark,  we  find  Jesus  first 
teaching  in  Galilee,  passing  for  a  brief  space  northwards,  out  of 
Galilee,  on  to  heathen  soil,  and  then  turning  again  southwards  and 
moving  towards  Jerusalem.  But  Matthew  is  much  longer  than 
Mark.  As  regards  the  last  days  of  Jesus's  life,  the  arrest,  the  trial, 
and  the  crucifixion,  there  is  no  great  difference  between  them — 
136  verses  in  Matthew  and  119  verses  in  Mark.  But  Matthew 
opens  his  book  with  a  long  genealogy  and  with  an  account  of 
Jesus's  birth  and  infancy,  which  are  wanting  in  Mark.  These 
occupy  forty-eight  verses.  From  the  opening  of  his  book  to  the 
beginning  of  the  events  of  the  Passion,  Mark  has  thirteen 
chapters  and  539  verses.  From  the  point  where  Mark  begins  to 
the  same  place  in  the  narrative,  Matthew  has  twenty-three  chapters 
and  863  verses,  that  is,  324  verses  more  than  Mark,  or  just  three- 
fifths  as  much  again.  Of  this  large  amount  of  extra  material  a 
very  considerable  proportion  consists  of  speeches — reports  of  words 
said  by  Jesus  rather  than  of  things  done  by  him. 

But  in  reality  the  extra  material  of  sayings  is  still  larger.  For 
many  narratives  in  Mark  are  considerably  curtailed  in  Matthew, 
and  there  are  a  few  things  in  Mark  which  do  not  appear  in 
Matthew  at  all.  Roughly  speaking  there  are  some  410  verses  in 
Matthew  which  contain  sayings  of  Jesus  which  are  not  found  in 
Mark,  and  of  these  410  verses  we  may  take  it  that  some  230  have 
more  or  less  close  parallels  in  Luke,  while  some  180  verses  are 
peculiar  to  Matthew.  Thus  Matthew  (like  Luke)  is  composed  of 
three  parts  :  material  common  to  him  and  Mark,  material  common 
to  him  and  Luke,  material  found  only  in  him.  (It  should,  of 
course,  be  remembered  that  much  of  the  Mark  material  which 
is  reproduced  in  Matthew  is  also  reproduced  in  Luke.) 


§  13.     The  relation  of  Matthew  and  Luke  to  Q. 

Of  those  portions  of  Matthew  which  have  no  parallel  in  Mark, 
and  which,  as  we  have  seen,  as  regards  the  sayings  of  Jesus, 
amount  to  about  180  verses  for  what  is  peculiar  to  Matthew, 
and  about  230  verses  for  what  he  shares  with  Luke,  the  more 
important  and  more  interesting  portion  is  that  which  is  common, 
more  or  less  completely  and  verbally,  to  the  first  and  the  third 
Evangelists.  This  portion,  as  I  have  already  said,  is  supposed  by 
most  great  scholars  not  to  have  been  borrowed  by  Matthew  from 
Luke,  or  by  Luke  from  Matthew,  but  to  have  been  taken  by  both 
Matthew  and  Luke  from  a  common  source,  now  generally  spoken 
of  as  Q.  It  will  be  convenient  to  adopt  this  same  nomenclature 
here. 


xliv  INTRODUCTION 

Some  remarks  about  Q  have  already  been  made  in  the 
preceding  section.  We  have  seen  that  the  original  character  and 
range  of  the  document  are  still  in  dispute.  It  probably  began 
with  the  baptism  of  Jesus,  and  thus,  like  Mark,  regarded  Jesus 
as  entering  upon  his  Messianic  office  from  that  moment.  It 
included  the  temptation,  but  most  scholars  hold  that  it  did  not 
include  any  account  of  the  Passion  or  resurrection.  It  was 
essentially  a  collection  of  the  sayings  and  speeches  of  Jesus,  and 
where  it  incorporated  any  story,  it  did  so  in  order  to  give  the 
occasion  and  background  of  a  saying  or  a  speech.  I  have  already 
mentioned  Harnack's  book  on  the  subject  of  Q,  in  which  the  great 
theologian  earnestly  and  even  vehemently  pleads  for  Q's  primitive 
character,  authenticity  and  early  date.  I  have  also  mentioned 
how  Wellhausen  maintains  a  contrary  hypothesis,  arguing  that 
Q  is  later  than  Mark,  and  that  the  words  which  Q  puts  into  the 
mouth  of  Jesus  must  always  be  regarded  with  more  suspicion 
than  those  which  are  assigned  to  him  by  Mark.  Not  that  Well- 
hausen would  by  any  means  wish  to  controvert  the  authenticity 
of  all  the  Q  material.  But  he  does  hold  a  much  smaller  proportion 
to  be  genuine  than  Harnack,  who  practically  accepts  the  whole. 

How  much  of  what  we  now  find  in  Matthew  and  Luke  may 
be  assigned  to  Q  ?  This  is  a  still  disputed  question,  and  can 
never  be  ascertained  with  certainty.  Harnack  is  very  cautious. 
His  estimate  of  Q  comes  only  to  about  202  verses,  while  some 
28  verses  more  are  regarded  as  doubtful.  Loisy  assigns  to  the 
source  a  very  much  larger  quantity  of  verses.  For  example,  many 
of  the  parables  which  are  only  found  in  Matthew  or  are  only 
found  in  Luke,  Loisy  assigns  to  Q.  B.  Weiss,  again,  in  his 
estimate  of  Q,  differs  both  from  Harnack  and  from  Loisy.  Never- 
theless, all  that  Harnack  allots  to  Q  is  also  allotted  to  him  by 
Loisy  and  Weiss.  Wellhausen  thinks  it  doubtful  whether  all 
those  passages  which  are  common  to  Luke  and  Matthew  may 
with  assurance  be  always  assigned  to  one  source  only.  And  I  am 
inclined  to  think  that  if  we  are  driven  to  assume  that  Mark  knew 
Q,  we  must,  at  any  rate,  accept  the  hypothesis  of  Jillicher  that  Q 
went  through  many  editions,  and  that  while  its  oldest  bits  are 
very  old,  its  latest  bits,  and  the  form  in  which  Matthew  knew  and 
used  it,  are  as  late  as,  or  later  than,  Mark. 

§  14.     Harnack's  estimate  of  the  size  and  character  of  Q. 

Harnack,  as  I  have  said,  is  very  emphatic  on  the  authenticity 
and  originality  of  the  202  verses  which  he  thinks  may  most 
probably  be  assigned  to  Q.     These  verses  comprise  the  following 


INTRODUCTION  sir 

passages  from  Matthew,  though  Matthew  has  not  by  any  means 
always  preserved  the  most  original  form. 

Matthew  iii.     5,7-12. 
iv.     i-ii. 

V.     1-4,  6,  1 1-13,  IS,  18,  25,  26,  32,  39,  40,  42,  44-48. 
vi.    9-13,  19-33. 
vii.     i-s,  7-14,  16-18,  21,  24-28. 
viii.     5-13,  19-22. 
ix.     37.  38- 

X.     7,  106,  12,  13,  IS,  16 a,  24-40. 
xi.     2-13,  16-19,  21-23,  25-27. 
xii.     22,  23,  25.  27,  28,  30,  32,  33,  38,  39,  41-45. 
xiii.     16,17,31-33. 
XV.     14. 
xvii.     20  b. 

xviii.     7,  12,  13,  15,  21,  22. 
xix.     28. 

xxiii.     4,  12,  13,  23,  25,  27,  29-32,  34-39. 
xxiv.     26-28,  37-41,  43-51- 
XXV.     29. 

All  these  verses  have  their  parallels  in  Luke.  The  scholars 
are  not  in  agreement  as  to  the  question  whether  Luke  or 
Matthew  has  better  preserved  the  original  text  of  Q.  In  some 
passages  doubtless  it  is  Luke  who  has  done  so,  in  other  passages 
Matthew.  Reference  will  be  made  to  this  question  in  several 
places  in  the  commentary.  In  some  passages  the  verbal  agree- 
ment is  much  closer  than  in  others. 

Another  question  concerns  the  order.  A  considerable  part  of 
the  202  verses  appears  in  the  same  order  both  in  Matthew  and 
Luke,  and  on  the  basis  of  this  agreement  Harnack  has  drawn  up 
a  table  of  contents  for  at  least  a  large  portion  of  Q.  The  com- 
bination of  sayings  into  long  and  formal  speeches  which  we  find 
in  Matthew  existed  already  in  Q,  though  not  to  the  same  extent. 
But  there  was  already  in  Q,  much  where  we  find  them  in  Matthew, 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (in  a  shorter  form),  the  oration  to  the 
apostles  on  their  being  sent  upon  their  missionary  journey,  the 
speech  about  John  the  Baptist,  the  diatribe  against  the  Pharisees, 
and  a  speech  about  the  Parousia  and  the  'last  things.'  On  the 
whole  Harnack  is  of  opinion  that  Matthew  has  preserved  the  order 
of  Q  better  than  Luke.  B.  Weiss,  who  has  a  different  and  more 
generous  estimate  of  the  amount  of  material  to  be  assigned  to  Q, 
also  often  differs  from  Harnack  as  to  the  question  of  order  and  as 
to  the  original  text  and  its  comparatively  better  preservation  in 
Matthew  or  Luke. 


xlvi  INTRODUCTION 

Both  what  we  find  and  what  we  do  not  find  in  Q  are  in  accord- 
ance with  Harnack's  special  conception  of  Jesus  and  his  teaching. 
One  is  therefore  bound  to  weigh  very  carefully  his  pleadings  foi 
Q's  authenticity.  Nevertheless,  an  outsider  like  myself  reading 
Q  (as  picked  out  from  Matthew  and  Luke  by  Harnack)  has  the 
impression  that  the  much  larger  majority  of  the  202  verses  as- 
signed to  it  contain  nothing  which  Jesus  may  not  have  uttered,  and 
that  the  large  majority  of  them  contain  very  much  which  he  most 
probably  did  utter.  It  seems  quite  true  that  Q,  when  Matthew's 
editorial  additions  and  settings  are  peeled  off,  has  no  distinctive 
tendency.  It  is,  as  Harnack  says,  a  compilation  of  discourses  and 
sayings, '  the  arrangement  of  which  has  no  reference  to  the  Passion, 
with  an  horizon  which  is  as  good  as  absolutely  bounded  by  Galilee, 
without  any  clearly  discernible  bias,  whether  apologetic,  didactic, 
ecclesiastical,  national,  or  anti-national '  (Harnack,  op.  cit.  p.  121, 
E.T.  p.  171). 

Whether  we  could  say  the  same  thing  if  Q  included  all  that 
Loisy,  or  even  B.  Weiss,  would  make  it  include,  may  well  be 
doubted.  But  as  to  those  sections  of  Matthew  and  Luke  which 
are  only  found  in  those  two  Gospels  respectively,  Harnack  says 
with  great  caution:  'it  is  probable  a  prion,  and  even  certain,  that 
much  which  is  peculiar  to  Matthew  and  Luke  was  taken  from  Q, 
but  I  do  not  venture  to  mention  any  part  of  the  material  special 
either  to  Matthew  or  Luke,  which  one  is  justified  in  allocating 
to  Q'  (op.  cit.  p.  130). 


§  15.     The  parallels  of  Q  with  Mark 

It  may  be  convenient  to  mention  here  the  few  parallels  in  Q 
to  passages  in  Mark.  I  have  already  indicated  that  some  of  these 
will  come  up  for  discussion  in  the  commentary.  There  are  three 
possible  explanations :  Mark  borrowed  them  from  Q ;  Q  borrowed 
them  from  Mark;  both  Mark  and  Q  knew  them  independently 
from  a  common  oral  tradition.  The  first  and  third,  or  the  second 
and  third  of  these  explanations  may  both  be  used  for  different 
passages. 

(i)  To  four  verses  in  that  portion  of  Matthew's  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  which  Harnack  assigns  to  Q  there  are  four  isolated 
parallels  in  Mark.     (I  do  not  here  give  the  parallels  in  Luke.) 

Thus  Matt.  V.  13  corresponds  with  Mark  ix.  50. 

V-  ^S  „                 „          iv.  21. 

»            ^-..32  „                     „            X.  II. 

>'          vii.  I  „                 J,          iv_  24. 


INTEODUCTION  xlvii 

(2)  Again,  in  those  verses  which  Hamack  assigns  to  Q  from 
the  long  oration  in  Matthew  when  Jesus  sends  out  the  apostles, 
there  are  seven  parallels,  namely, 

Matt.  X.  10  corresponds  with  Mark  vi.  8. 
„    X.  14  „  „         vi.  II. 


X.  26 

X.  33 
X.  38 

X.  39 
X.  40 


IV.  22. 

viii.  38. 
viii.  34. 
viii.  35. 
ix.  37. 


(As  to  the  inclusion  of  Matt.  x.  40  in  Q,  Harnack  declares 
himself  very  dubious.) 

(3)  Again,  in  Matthew's  chapter  about  Beelzebul  and  Jesus's 
defence  against  the  Pharisees,  there  are  three  important  parallels: 

Matt.  xii.  25  corresponds  with  Mark  iii.  24. 
„     xii.  32  „  „         iii.  29. 

„     xii.  39  „  „  viii.  12. 

In  addition  to  these  we  have  (4)  the  parallel  between  Matt. 
xvii.  20  and  Mark  xi.  23,  and  (5)  there  is  the  parable  of  the 
mustard  seed,  which  in  Matthew  and  Luke  Harnack  holds  was 
taken  from  Q  and  not  from  Mark  (Matt.  xiii.  31,  32;  Mark  iv. 

31.  32). 

The  deductions  and  arguments  which  these  parallels  have 
suggested  to  scholars  will  be  alluded  to  in  the  commentary. 


§  16.     Date  and  origin  of  Q. 

I  have  already  stated  that  Q's  birthplace  was  Palestine,  that  it 
was  probably  written  originally  in  Aramaic,  and  that  in  its  oldest 
form  it  goes  back  to  a  very  early  date,  say  between  50  to  60  a.d. 
Is  anything  more  known,  or  to  be  inferred,  as  to  its  author  ?  Here 
too  some  weight  may  be  assigned  to  a  statement  of  Papias.  He 
says  (whether  on  the  authority  of  John  the  Elder  or  no  is  un- 
certain), 'Matthew  wrote  the  sayings  (of  Jesus)  in  the  Hebrew 
language,  and  each  one  interpreted  them  as  he  was  able' 
(Margate?  yikv  oZv  'E^paiSi  SiaXeKrw  rd  Xoyia  o-weypdifraTO, 
ijp/jLijvevae  S"  avrd,  to?  ■^v  Bwaro^  eKaaro^).  Papias  was  here 
alluding  to  our  Gospel  of  Matthew.  It  is,  however,  absolutely 
■certain  that  the  first  Gospel  was  not  written  by  an  apostle,  a,nd 
that  its  date  is  nearer  90  or  1 00  than  60.  Hence  the  suggestion 
has  found  iavour  with  some  scholars  that  the  Logia,  or  sayings 
which  the  apostle  Matthew  really  drew  up,  was  that  source  of  the 


xlviii  INTEODUCTION 

first  Gospel  which  is  now  known  as  Q.  Harnack  calls  this 
suggestion  '  uberwiegend  wahrscheinlich ' ;  Loisy,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  very  much  more  sceptical.  How  did  Q  get  lost  ?  Would 
a  book  properly  guaranteed  as  an  apostolic  work,  and  presented  as 
such  to  the  earliest  Christian  communities,  have  so  easily  dis- 
appeared? The  matter  can  never  be  now  ascertained.  Loisy, 
like  Julicher,  allows  for  some  growth  and  expansion  of  the  original 
Q:  'S'il  a  et6  compose  en  aram^en,  on  n'aura  pas  tarde  ^  le 
traduire  en  grec.  Des  interpolations  jud6o-chr^tiennes,  qui  ont 
leur  6cho  jusque  dans  Luc,  y  avaient  ^t6  bientSt  introduites,  avec 
les  complements  divers '  {E.  S.  I.  p.  143).  Some  of  these  '  com- 
plements divers'  are,  I  am  inclined  to  believe,  later  than  Mark. 
But,  in  spite  of  these  additions,  Q  remains  a  most  valuable 
and  ancient  authority  for  the  utterances  of  Jesus  and  for  his 
conceptions  of  religion  and  morality,  if  not  also  for  his  conception 
of  his  own  person  and  of  his  relation  to  God. 


§  17.     Tests  for  authenticity  of  sayings  attributed  to  Jesus. 

Let  me  say,  however,  here  and  at  once,  that  the  importance 
of  the  question  of  the  authenticity  of  all  the  words  assigned  to 
Jesus  in  Q  (or  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  as  a  whole)  must  not 
be  exaggerated.  Or  rather  let  me  put  it  thus :  the  importance 
of  the  Gospels  for  modern  Judaism  does  not  merely  hinge  upon 
the  question  of  authenticity.  From  one  point  of  view  the  question 
of  authenticity  does  not  indeed  greatly  matter. 

The  excellence  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  is  neither  impaired 
nor  increased  if  Jesus  said  all  of  it  or  much  the  greater  part  of  it, 
or  if  he  did  not.  Modern  Judaism  must  study  the  words  ascribed 
to  Jesus  and  take  up  an  attitude  towards  them,  whether  Jesus 
spoke  them  or  no.  But  historically  or  biographically  the  question 
whether  all  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  or  whether  Matt.  xi.  25-27, 
is  authentic  or  not  remains  very  important  and  interesting.  Though 
these  authenticity  problems  can  never  be  definitely  resolved,  they 
are  bound  to  retain  their  fascination  and  attractiveness. 

One  very  popular  argument  may  be  here  mentioned  which  is 
combated  by  Wellhausen.  It  can  only,  however,  be  most  briefly 
alluded  to.  It  is  commonly  said  that  the  greatest,  most  striking, 
most  original  things  in  the  Gospels  must  be  authentic  because  only 
Jesus  could  have  thought  of  them.  It  can  be  shown,  it  is  said,- 
'  that  his  disciples  or  reporters  were  mediocre  men  for  the  most 
part,  who  often  misunderstood  their  Master,  and  were  certainly 
not  capable  of  creative  and  original  thought.  On  the  contrary, 
we  find  instances  in  which  a  too  daring  utterance  of  the  Master 


INTRODUCTION  xlix 

has  been  subjected  to  compromise  and  commonplace  by  addition 
or  qualification.  I  had  never  been  quite  persuaded  by  this  argu- 
ment. Each  case  must  be  dealt  with  on  its  merits,  and  when  so 
dealt  with,  the  argument  does  not  always  seem  to  hold.  Fon 
instance,  one  of  the  noblest  sayings  in  the  Gospels  is  surely : 
'Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do'  (Luke 
xxiii.  34).  But  this  verse  is  almost  certainly  not  authentic. 
Hence  I  was  very  much  interested  to  find  that  Wellhausen  raises 
a  protest  against  a  too  constant  use  of  the  argument  that  the 
value  of  the  contents  is  the  guarantee  of  the  authenticity.  'Truth,' 
he  says,  'testifies  only  to  itself  and  not  to  its  author'  ('Die  Wahr- 
heit  bezeugt  nur  sich  selber  und  nicht  ihren  Autor ').  And  then 
he  goes  on  to  make  a  remark,  which  Julicher  calls  a  'kiihnes 
Wagnis'  (Einleitung,  p.  341),  but  which  seems  to  me  to  gain 
support  from  the  fine  and  noble  things  which  are  occasionally  due 
to  the  editors  and  glossators  of  the  Hebrew  prophets :  '  The  spirit  1 
of  Jesus  continued  to  live  in  the  earliest  community,  and  it  was 
the  community  which  not  only  created  the  Gospel  about  him,  but 
also  developed  his  moral  teaching  upon  the  basis  which  he  had 
laid  down.  The  ethical  teaching  of  the  community  was  therefore 
the  true  product  of  what  Jesus  had  said  and  been :  those  words  in 
which  his  spirit  was  made  manifest  seemed  (and  with  good  inward 
reason)  to  be  equal  in  value  to  that  which  in  similar  circumstances 
he  himself  would  have  said '  (Einleitung,  p.  86). 

I  do  not  undervalue  the  arguments  on  the  other  side,  of  which 
I  will  mention  some  more  in  a  moment ;  but  I  do  strongly  urge 
that  Wellhausen's  argument  must  also  be  given  its  proper  weight. 
Take  such  a  passage  as  Matt.  xxv.  35-40.  Can  anything  be 
imagined  more  superb?  Anything  which,  given  and  assuming 
the  point  of  view  of  the  writer,  is  more  redolent  of  true  inspiration  ? 
But  is  it  not  certain  that  this  passage  was  not  spoken  by  Jesus  ? 

Wellhausen  perhaps  presses  too  greatly  the  canon  that  as  the 
measure  for  the  authenticity  of  the  words  assigned  to  Jesus  we 
have  first  and  foremost  to  take  the  degree  of  literary  testimony. 
Thus  in  the  first  degree  of  value  would  come  what  is  said  by 
Jesus  in  Mark,  next  what  is  said  by  him  both  in  Matthew  and 
Luke  (Q),  and  lastly,  what  is  said  by  him  only  in  Matthew  and 
only  in  Luke.  Wellhausen  admits  that  the  oral  tradition  is  older 
than  ij^  written  precipitate  and  not  ohTy  older  but  larger.  But 
£e  urges  "that"  in  the  crourse  of  time  (and  "of  a  comparatively 
short  time)  the  primary  authentic  tradition  diminished,  and  the 
secondary  unauthentic  tradition  increased.  And  in  opposition  to 
the  current  opinion  he  holds  '  that  the  oral  tradition  of  the  sayings 
and  speeches  gradually  increased  and  developed  in  much  greater 
bulk  than  the  tradition  of  what  Jesus  did  and  what  befell  him ' 

M.  <l 


1  INTRODUCTION 

('dass  die  tJberlieferung  des  Redestoffs  sich  im  Lauf  der  Zeit  vie! 
starker  entwickelt  und  vermehrt  hat  als  die  des  erzahlenden  Stofifs') 
(Einleitung,  p.  85). 

r  On  the  other  side,  we  have  to  remember  that  Jesus  may  or 
even  must  have  repeated  some  of  his  sayings,  parables  and 
teachings  again  and  again,  and  that  the  memories  of  orientals 
•who  write  little,  and  use  no  notebooks,  is  very  retentive.  After 
his  death  the  words  of  Jesus  will  have  been  constantly  recounted 
to  fresh  disciples ;  they  will  have  been  treasured  up  and  pondered 
over.  Hence  it  may  be  argued  that,  if  there  are  not  definite 
internal   reasons  which   plead   for   a   later  date,  we    may  fairly 

J'-onfidently  assign  to  Jesus  the  words  ascribed  to  him  by  Matthew 
ily  and  by  Luke  only,  if  they  are  words  which  seem  to  harmonize 
ith  his  character  and  teaching  as  we  can  gather  and  infer  them 
om  the  pages  of  Mark  and  (as  most  scholars,  in  spite  of  Well- 
1  nausen,  would  add)  of  Q. 

It  is  indeed  the  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels  which  argue  for  the  historical  character  of  the  man  and 
of  his  life.  I  would  like  to  quote  here  the  measured  statement  of 
the  great  philosopher  Wundt,  which  I  happened  to  come  across  in 
turning  over  the  leaves  of  his  huge  Volkerpsychologie  (Zweiter 
Band,  'Mythus  und  Religion,'  Dritter  Teil,  1909,  p.  528):  'No 
unprejudiced  person,  who  is  only  tolerably  familiar  with  the  ways 
in  which  myths  are  formed,  and  who  has  also  fairly  followed  the 
growing  discovery  and  elucidation  of  the  sources  of  old  oriental 
legends,  can  to-day  any  longer  doubt  that  with  the  exception  of 
a  few  incidents  in  the  narrative  of  the  Passion,  which  probably 
possess  an  adequate  historic  attestation,  the  outward  life  of  Jesus 
is  a  tissue  of  legends.  But  that  which  these  legends  leave  un- 
touched, and  that  which  is  never  found  in  their  mythological 
counterparts  and  predecessors,  is  the  series  of  sayings  and  speeches 
of  Jesus,  as  they  have  been  handed  down  to  us  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels.' 

§  18.     The  theories  of  Mr  Allen  and  Professor  Burton. 

It  should  perhaps  be  added  that  the  conceptions  about  Q, 
even  in  the  cautious  form  in  which  they  are  enunciated  by 
Harnaek  and  Wellhausen,  are  not  accepted  by  all  scholars. 
Mr  Allen,  for  instance,  has  considerably  different  views  about  the 
sources  of  Matthew,  and  consequently  about  Q.  He  thinks  that 
it  is  rash  and  impossible  to  assign  all  those  sections  of  Matthew 
for  which  there  are  parallels  in  Luke,  but  not  in  Mark,  to  one 
common  source.  The  great  varieties  of  language  and  context 
with  which  we  are  confronted  in  respect  of  these  parallel  passages 


INTRODUCTION  li 

is,  as  he  thinks,  a  very  valid  objection  to  such  a  hypothesis. 
[Has  the  considerable  agreement  in  order,  which  Harnack  in  his 
book  on  Q  pointed  out,  perhaps  sufficed  to  modify  this  opinion  ?] 
Allen  remarks  that  if  Wellhausen  is  right  in  supposing  that  some 
of  the  variants  between  Matthew  and  Luke  imply  a  dififerent 
Greek  translation  of  an  Aramaic  original,  or  that  we  have  to 
assume  that  both  Evangelists  knew  and  used  the  Aramaic  as  well 
as  one  and  the  same  Greek  translation,  then  this  very  supposition 
is  an  argument  against  a  common  source.  For  that  '  the  two 
Evangelists  had  access  not  only  to  a  Greek  translation  of  the 
supposed  common  written  source,  but  also  to  the  Aramaic  original, 
is  a  clumsy  theory.'  It  is  'a  complicated  and  unnecessary  con- 
jecture that  the  two  Evangelists  sometimes  altered  their  Greek 
original  and  sometimes  substituted  for  it  a  new  translation  from 
the  original  Aramaic'  The  'great  amount  of  disagreement  in 
substance,  in  setting,  in  order  and  in  language,  between  Matthew 
and  Luke  in  these  sayings  [of  Jesus],  is  only  explicable  if  they 
were  not  directly  using  a  common  source.' 

Allen's  own  theory  which  in  one  important  point  coincides 
with  Burton's,  seems,  however,  open  to  grave  objections.  He 
makes  a  list  of  all  the  sayings  and  speeches  attributed  to  Jesus 
in  Matthew  which  are  peculiar  to  that  Evangelist.  He  finds  that 
the  great  majority  of  these  sayings  have  'a  common  character. 
They  are  (a)  parabolic,  or  (b)  anti-Pharisaic,  or  (c)  strongly  Jewish- 
Christian,  or  (d)  couched  in  Jewish  phraseology '  (Gospel,  according 
to  St  Matthew,  p.  liv.).  Hence  he  assumes  that  they  came  all,  or 
in  large  part,  from  a  single  source.  It  is  this  source  which  was 
the  Logia  of  Matthew  of  which  Papias  speaks.  'If  the  editor 
of  Matthew  borrowed  these  sayings  from  the  Matthean  document, 
whether  it  lay  before  him  in  its  original  form  or  in  a  Greek  trans- 
lation, we  have  at  once  an  explanation  of  the  reason  why  the  name 
Matthew  attached  itself  to  the  first  Gospel  of  which  these  sayings 
form  a  substantial  proportion.'  Precisely  the  same  hypothesis  is 
taken  up  by  Professor  Burton  in  his  interesting,  but  unsatisfying, 
pamphlet.  Principles  of  Literary  Criticism  and  the  Synoptic 
Problem  (1904).  The  hypothesis,  he  argues,  'explains  as  no 
theory  which  makes  the  Matthean  Logia  a  source  of  both  Matthew 
and  Luke  or  of  all  three  Synoptists  can  explain,  how  the  present 
Gospel  of  Matthew  obtained  the  name '  (p.  41). 

But  is  it  not  a  fatal  objection  to  this  theory  that  it  makes  the 
oldest  document  the  home  and  source  of  sayings  which  are  so 
obviously  later,  such  as  xiiL  24-30,  36-43,  xvi.  17-19,  xviii.  15-20, 
xxiii.  34-38,  XXV.  31-46?  Some  portions  of  what  is  peculiar  to 
Matthew  may  come  from  Q  or  from  some  other  ancient  source, 
but  surely  very  far  from  all. 

d2 


lii  INTRODUCTION 

From  this  special  Matthean  source  Mr  Allen  further  supposes 
that  the  editor  of  Matthew  borrowed  also  many  of  the  sayings 
•which  he  has  in  common  with  Luke,  but  in  a  different  form  and 
context.  From  other  Greek  translations  of  the  Logia  than  that 
■which  the  first  Evangelist  used,  'excerpts  and  groups  of  sayings 
passed  into  one  or  other  of  the  "  many  "  evangelic  writings  with 
which  Luke  was  acquainted.'  '  When  Luke  wrote  his  Gospel,  he 
found  these  sayings  dispersed  in  many  quarters.  Some  of  them, 
e.g.  the  Beatitudes  and  the  Lord's  Prayer,  had  passed  through 
many  stages  since  they  were  first  extracted  from  the  Logia' 
(p.  Ix.).  The  net  result  of  Mr  Allen's  hypothesis  is,  however,  that 
almost  all  those  words  of  Jesus  in  Matthew  which  Hamack 
assigns  to  Q,  Mr  Allen  assigns  to  the  Matthean  Logia,  but  this 
collection  contained  in  addition  (according  to  Mr  Allen)  all  or 
most  of  those  sayings  which  are  peculiar  to  Matthew.  And 
Mr  Allen  is  only  able  at  the  last  to  explain  satisfactorily  the 
frequent  'remarkably  close'  agreement  between  Matthew  and  Luke 
on  the  very  doubtful  hypothesis  that  Luke  'may  well  have  read 
the  first  Gospel,  and  have  been  sometimes  influenced  by  it'  (p.  Ix.). 

As  against  the  theories  of  Allen  and  Burton  it  may,  I  think, 
be  said  that  in  spite  of  certain  difficulties,  which  are  not  to  be 
denied  or  slurred  over,  the  ordinary  theory  of  Q,  in  one  or  other 
of  its  various  forms,  still  holds  the  field. 

§  19.     Other  sources  of  Matthew  besides  Q  and  Mark. 
The  'doubly  attested  sayings.' 

That  Matthew  was  not  limited  to  the  two  sources  Mark  and 
Q  is  tolerably  clear.  He,  like  Luke,  had  more  than  two  sources, 
and  much  of  that  portion  of  his  contents,  which  is  peculiar  to 
himself,  may  yet  not  have  been  written  by  himself,  but  be  taken 
from  other  sources  of  which  we  now  know  nothing.  It  may  also 
be  observed  that  embedded  in  those  portions  of  the  'speech' 
material  in  Matthew  and  Luke  which  was  not  drawn  from  Q 
(according  to  Harnack's  estimate  of  Q),  there  are  a  few  more 
parallels  with  Mark.  These  parallels,  too,  probably  imply  in  many 
cases  that  neither  the  sources  of  Matthew  and  Luke  borrowed 
from  Mark  nor  Mark  from  those  sources.  Such  parallels  would 
form  a  group  of  what  Professor  Burkitt  calls  'doubly  attested 
sayings.'  He  draws  up  a  list  of  thirty-one  such  sayings  in  all, 
but  the  independence  of  the  Matthew  or  Luke  source  from  Mark, 
and  of  Mark  from  the  Matthew  or  Luke  source,  needs  careful 
testing  in  each  particular  case.  In  many  of  the  thirty-one  in- 
stances it  is,  to  say  the  least,  doubtful  {Gospel  History  and  iU 
transmission,  pp.  148-166). 


INTRODUCTION  liii 


§  20.     Matthew  as  editor.    His  point  of  view.    His  relation 
to  Judaism  and  the  Old  Testament.    His  date. 

So  much  then  of  Matthew's  sources.     But  the  writer  who 
borrowed  or  used  all  these  sources  is  not  an  unimportant  element 
or  factor  in  his  own  book.     As  he  borrows,  he  sometimes  changes ; 
he  edits,  groups,  expands,  comments.    He  has  his  own  point  of  view. 
It  may  be  that  these  editorial  additions  and  settings  sometimes 
I  obscure  the  authenticity  of  the  material  which  Matthew  has  used, 
\  and  that  even  in  sayings  and  parables  which  are  only  found  in  the 
[first  Evangelist  a  greater  proportion  is  authentic  than  sceptical 
jscholars  will    allow.     Thus  Matthew  has  some   seven   parables 
which  are  peculiar  to  him  (xiii.  24-30,  44-50,  xviii.  23-35,  ^^^ 
1-16,  xxi.  28-31,  XXV.  1-13,  31-46).     Of  these  Wellhausen  ob- 
serves :  '  They  are  the  elaborately  worked  out  products  of  careful 
deliberation ;  they  are  not  the  creations  of  the  particular  moment, 
but  (from  the  standpoint  of  Jesus)  they  refer  to  the  future.     All 
of  them  deal  with  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  regarding  it  as  a 
sown  field,  or  as  a  vineyard,  or  as  the  earthly  sphere  of  labour  of 
the  household  servants  of  God ;  he  as  king,  or  master,  or  landlord, 
on  the  one  side,  is  opposed  to  the  slaves  or  the  sons  (it  comes 
to  the  same  thing)  of  his  household  on  the  other;    they  work 
together  on  his  property,  and  among  each  other  they  are  marked 
off  by  unimportant  outward,  and  also  by  important  inward,  differ- 
ences.   At  the  last,  they  receive  their  reward,  in  that,  distinguished 
now  by  the  inward  worth  of  their  service,  some  of  them   are 
received  into  the  kingdom  of  glory,  while  others  are  rejected' 
{Einleitung,  p.  69).     But  these  assertions  must  be  tested  in  each 
individual  case,  and  especially  as  regards  the  meaning  which  may 
have  been  originally  intended,  and  the  meaning  which  Matthew 
-  would  have  us  give  to  each  particular  parable  of  the  seven.     So 
regarded  Loisy  may  be  right  in  thinking  that  the  parables  of  the 
treasure  and  the  pearl  and  the  net  (xiii.  44-50),  the  parables  of 
the  wicked  servant  and  of  the  workers  in  the  vineyard  (xviii.  23- 
35,  XX.  I-16),  and  the  parable  of  the  two  sons  (xxi.  28-31),  may 
without  much  hesitation  be  assigned  to  Q  and  be  authentic,  while 
we  may  hesitate  more  as  to  the  origin  of  the  parable  of  the  wise 
and  foolish  virgins  (xxv.  1-13),  and  perhaps  still  more  about  the 
parable  of  the  tares  (xiii.  24-30).  ^- — 

The  author  of  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  appears  to  have  been 
of  Jewish  origin,  and  to  have  been  specially  interested  in  the 
'^Jewish  aspect  of  Christianity.     He  probably  thought  that  Chris- 
tianity— for  by  his  time  one  can  speak  of  the  new  religion  as 
distinct  from  the  old — was  the  true  development  of  Judaism, 


liv  INTRODUCTION 

the  fulfilment  and  consummation  of  the  Law  and  the  Prophets, 

?'The  disciples  are  a  new  legitimate  Israel,  and  bound  together  by 

( a  New  Law  which  takes  the  place  of  the  Old.     The  keynote  of 

'<  the  work  is  not  the  opposition  of  Law  and  Grace,  as  in  S.  Paul, 

but  the  opposition  of  the  Old  Law  and  the  New '  (Burkitt,  op.  cit. 

A  p.  1 88).     The  author  was  much  interested  in  showing  (according 

;to  the  usual  strained  and  arbitrary  exegesis  of  his  time)  that  the 

main  incidents  of  Jesus's  career  were  a  fulfilment  of  Old  Testament 

predictions.     Hence  it  is  in  Matthew  that  we  have  the  largest 

,  number  of  Old  Testament  quotations.     '  Matthew '  wrote  in  Greek, 

and  many  of  his  quotations  are  taken  from  the  Septuagint.     But 

others  seem  translated  direct  from  the  Hebrew — a  fact  which  has 

been  variously  explained.     It  may  be  that  the  author  understood 

Hebrew  and  made  these  translations  himself;  it  may  be  that  in 

these  instances  he  is  merely  borrowing  from  a  source  which  already 

contained  them. 

The  date  of  Matthew  is  generally  supposed  to  be  about  90  to 
100  A.D.  The  commentary  will  show  that  his  conception  of  Jesus 
was  more  developed  than  that  of  Mark.  Jesus  cannot  be  allowed 
to  deprecate  his  being  called  '  good.'  His  miracles  are  heightened. 
His  simple  humanity,  so  clearly  reflected  in  Mark,  is  obscured. 
I  Whether  the  virgin  birth  episode  existed  in  the  earliest  form  of 
j  Matthew  is,  however,  disputed. 

'  The  Christian  Church  is  organized.  There  are  parties  in  it; 
good  members  and  bad.  It  has  its  own  ofiBcers  and  discipline. 
The  indications  of  all  this  will  be  alluded  to  in  the  commentary. 

The  first  Gospel  contains  a  curious  mixture  of  '  particularist ' 
(and  '  universalist '  sayings.     It  is  in  places  intensely  anti- Jewish  ; 
;  in  others  it  seems,  on  the  contrary,  to  ascribe  great  validity  and 
i  honour  to  the  Law  and  even  to  the  official  exposition  of  the  Law. 
;  These  contrasts  have  been  variously  explained.     It  seems  safest  to 
,  assume  that,  for  the  most  part,  the  particularist  or  '  legal '  passages  > 
;  are  quotations,  and  that  to  Matthew  they  no  longer  mean  what 
they  originally  meant.     They  are  spiritually  interpreted,  or  again 
they  are  intended  to  press  the  authority  of  the  Old  Testament  as 
a  whole  against  certain  extreme,  though  Christian,  teachers  who 
sought  to  depress  its  divinity  and  excellence.     Some  have  seen  in 
these  particularist  and  legal  sayings  the  opposition  of  the  Jewish- 
Christian  author  to  the  Paulinists.     But  this  view  is  very  much 
more  doubtful.     Yet  Professor  Burkitt  is  probably  quite  right  in 
saying  that '  nojbook  of  the  New  Testament  is  so  full  of  thoughts 
and  expressionTwHcIf  Tiave  a  real  parallel  in  Rabbinical  literature. 
iThe  Evangelist  is;  so  to  speak,  a  Christian  RabK,  thbughno'asilFt 
he  would  have  disclaimed  the  title.    If  the  Gospel  of  Mark  is  most 
'closely  in  touch  with  History,  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  is  most 


INTRODUCTION  Iv 

closeh^n  touch  with  the  Talmud.  Like  the  other  Gospels  it  is  in 
fOTBoTaliaiTlltWe^TiEe'eafthrljrltfe^f  Jesus  Christ,  hut  it  sets  forth 
that  life  with  reference  to  the  questions  that  most  nearly  concerned 
a  Church  composed  of  Palestinian  Christians.  No  doubt  the 
Evangelist  felt  himself  and  his  brethren  separated  from  the  mass 
of  his  unbelieving  fellow-countrymen.  The  Christians  form  an 
Ecclesia,  a  Society,  of  their  own  (xviii.  17),  distinct  from  ordinary 
Jews.... But  even  so,  the  unbelieving  Jew  is  nearer  than  the 
Gentile  and  the  tax-gatherer;  he  that  is  outcast  to  the  Jew  is 
outcast  also  to  the  Evangelist'  (Burkitt,  p.  191). 

The  relations  of  the  first  Gospel  to  the  third  are  still  disputed. 
It  is  extremely  doubtful  whether  either  knew  of  the  other.  A  few 
words  more  upon  the  subject  will  be  said  in  the  next  paragraph. 


§21.    Is  Matthew  'catholic'  or  Judwo-Ghristian? 

The  Gospel  of  Matthew  has  been  called  by  Renan  '  the  inost__ 
imjriortant  book  that  has  ever  been  written.'  It  won  for~itself 
immense  popularity,  and'TEei  Srst  place  m  the  hst  of  the  four 
Evangels.  It  is  the  catholic  Gospel,  not  merely  because  of  the 
passage  about  Peter,  but  because  of  its  inclusiveness.  It  does  not 
reconcile  differences  very  successfully,  but  still  it  includes  them. 
As  a  whole  it  does  not,  therefore,  incline  to  any  one  party,  but 
occupies  a  middle  place.  'Conservative  towards  tradition,  it  yet) 
stands  at  some  distance  from  its  spirit.  It  is  a  catholic  Gospel, 
and  its  genuinely  catholic  sentiment  and  tone  have  won  for  it  its 
first  place  among  the  four '  (Julicher,  Einleitung,  p,  265).  Its 
grand  collection  of  speeches  and  parables  give  it  a  peculiar 
character.  The  Gospel  of  Matthew  is  the  Gospel  of  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount.  This  alone  may  have  helped  to  secure  it  its  place 
of  honour  among  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  and  in  the 
hearts  of  men. 

Wellhausen  is  inclined  to  press  the  Judaeo-Christian  character 
of  Matthew,  and  to  limit  its  catholic  character  much  more  than 
Julicher.      '  Matthew   has    the    primitive   Christian   community  j 
of  Jerusalem  present  before  him,  which,  in  spite  of  everything, ,' 
yet  sought  to  hold  fast  to  Judaism.     The  Christian  hostility ; 
to  the  official  representatives  of  the  Law  is  nowhere  expressed  ■ 
more  bitterly  than  by  him:   only  by  him  are  they  stigmatized 
absolutely  and  without  qualification  as  hypocrites,  who  in  truth 
are  not  what  they  seem,  and  are  called  upon  to  be.     But  this  1 
enmity  is  at  the  same  time  a  rivalry  for  the  same  goal — for  the 
fulfilment  of  the  Law,  for  righteousness.     The  goal  for  Christians 
is  set  on  a  much  greater  height  than  for  the  Jews,  but   for 


Ivi  INTRODUCTION 

(that  very  reason  they  claim  to  be  the  true  representatives  of 
Judaism,  and  refuse  to  allow  the  false  representatives  (i.e.  the 
Jews)  to  drive  them  out.  They  still  take  part  in  the  Temple 
f  service  in  Jerusalem  (v.  23-25) ;  they  pay  the  Temple  tax  ;  when 
I  no  higher  duty  conflicts,  they  observe  the  Sabbath  strictly 
(xxiv.  20).  Fasting,  praying,  and  almsgiving  reniain  for  them 
also  important  exercises  in  righteousness.  Outside  Jerusalem 
they  restrict  their  missionary  activity  to  Jews,  they  exclude 
heathen  and  Samaritans,  and  refuse  to  throw  their  sacred  pearls 
before  swine  (vii.  6,  x.  S).  All  this  is  very  clearly  expressed ;  it  is 
laid  down  as  a  principle ;  and  it  has  more  weight  for  the  funda- 
mental character  of  Matthew  than  some  real  and  some  apparent 
contradictions  to  it,  which  also  occur.  In  spite  of  his  keen 
opposition  to  the  official  and  aristocratic  elements  in  Jewry  which 
were  hostile  to  Christianity,  Matthew  is  still  very  anxious  to 
,  maintain  the  connection  of  the  humble  Christian  community,  who 
'  were  drawn  from  the  lower  strata  of  the  population,  with  their 
Jewish  roots  and  soil :  in  language  and  manner  he  is  a  Rabbi  who 
believes  in  Jesus  the  Messiah,  and  herein  he  is  distinguished  and 
different  from  Mark'  (Einleitung,  p.  70).  The  evidence  for  this  view 
of  Matthew  will  be  noticed  in  the  commentary.  If  the  passages 
on  which  Wellhausen  would  rely  are  merely  faithful  quotations  from 
the '  source,'  it  may  be  that  Jiilicher's  view  is  the  more  accurate ;  the 
older  the  Gospel  as  a  whole,  the  more  probable  is  Wellhausen's 
view  ;  the  later  it  is  as  a  whole,  the  more  probable  is  Jiilicher's. 


§  22.     '  Kingdom  of  Heaven '  in  Matthew :   authenticity 
of  the  parables  peculiar  to  Matthew. 

Wellhausen,  as  I  shall  notice  in  the  commentary,  presses  the 
view  that  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  in  Matthew  means  (not  as  it  did 
originally  to  Jesus,  and  as  it  did  to  Mark,  the  '  eschatological ' 
Kingdom  of  the  future),  but  the  present  Kingdom  as  realized, 
though,  so  far,  more  or  less  imperfectly  realized,  in  the  Christian 
Church.  Thus  he  says  :  '  The  Kingdom  as  present,  especially  as 
it  appears  in  Matthew,  was  founded  by  Jesus  :  he  is  its  necessary 
condition.  It  was  his  purpose  to  found  it,  and  for  that  very 
object  does  he  appear,  from  the  beginning  of  his  ministiy,  openly 
as  the  Messiah.  From  the  beginning  too  his  teaching  is  specially 
directed  to  his  disciples,  in  order  to  explain  to  them  how  his 
community  is  to  be  constituted,  and  what  is  to  befall  it  in  the 
future.  He  no  longer  (as  in  Mark)  scatters  his  teaching  seed  upon 
the  ground,  careless  of  the  result,  but  through  his  teaching  about 
the  Kingdom  he  sows  the  Kingdom  itself,  which  is  compared  with 


INTRODUCTION  Ivii 

the  sown  field  or  with  the  plant  in  the  same  way  as  with  the  vine- 
yard. That  by  the  Kingdom  he  means  the  Church  (the  iKKXija-ia) 
cannot  be  mistaken,  though  from  reasons  of  historic  propriety 
Matthew  usually  avoids  the  name.  His  true  meaning  is  specially 
clear  when  he  talks  of  Scribes  and  stewards,  of  older  and  younger 
elements,  of  worthy  and  unworthy  members,  of  the  Kingdom  of 
God ;  or  again  when  he  says  that  John  the  Baptist,  though  the 
greatest  Jew,  is  yet  smaller  than  the  lowliest  member  of  the 
Kingdom.  This  equivalence  of  Kingdom  and  Church  is  perfectly 
intelligible  ;  for  the  community  was  the  product  of  Jesus's  activity, 
and  was  regarded  as  the  vestibule  of  heaven.  But  nevertheless 
this  identiiication  of  Kingdom  with  Church  is  entirely  Christian;  it 
cannot  have  been  achieved  by  Jesus,  or,  still  less,  have  been  assumed 
by  him.  And  yet  in  Matthew  he  does  assume  it,  without  regarding 
any  explanation  of  it  as  necessary.  He  speaks  to  his  disciples  as 
if  they  were  already  his  community  and  organized  as  such  :  he 
projects  himself  into  a  future  situation  as  if  it  were  already 
present'  {Einleitung,  p.  io6). 

In  all  those  sayings  of  Jesus  in  Matthew  upon  the  basis  of 
which  Wellbausen  constructs  his  opinion,  it  is,  however,  necessary 
to  ask  how  far  they  may  not  owe  this  later  aspect  to  the  editor, 
and  how  far,  divested  of  setting  and  editorial  modifications,  they 
may  not  be  genuine  products  (borrowed  from  some  source)  oftHe 
teaching  ot  Jesus,     i'rofessor  Burkitt,  while  admitting  tUaTTEef 
aB(!5ve~paSsage~TiFom   Wellhausen  contains  'a  great  deal  that  is 
undeniably  true,'  yet  pleads  most  earnestly  for  the  historical  and 
a;uthentic  character  of  much  which  Matthew  puts  into  the  mouth  ; 
of  Jesus.     At  the  worst  the  sayings  of  Jesus  in  Matthew  (peculiar  f 
to  that  Gospel)  are  to  be  considered  '  rather  as  adaptations  of  what ' 
the  disciples  had  remembered  of  their  Master's  teaching  than  as 
new  inventions  made  for  the  purpose.... The  greater  part  of  the 
substance  of  the  teaching,  and  all  that  is  most  fresh  and  picturesque 
in  its  expression,  come  from  historical  reminiscence  of  the  Master's 
words.... Nowhere   in    early   Christian   literature,  except  in  the  i. 
three  Synoptic  Gospels,  do  we  find  that  picturesque  outlook  on  ; 
men  and  nature  that  finds  expression  in  the  Parables  of  Jesus'  J 
(flp.  cit.  pp.  195,  199).     There  seems  to  me  a  good  deal  of  force  in 
these  arguments. 

Even  Wellhausen,  in  spite  of  his  own  scepticism,  and  though, 
like  other  scholars,  he  holds  that  Matthew  as  a  whole  was  written 
after  the  fall  of  Jerusalem,  is  yet  obliged  to  point  out  that  the 
background  of  the  early  Christian  community  at  Jerusalem 
is  very  often  clearly  discernible  even  in  those  passages  which 
are  not  derived  either  from  Q  or  Mark.  '  Some  of  them,  as  for 
example    Matt.    xvii.  24-27,   must   be  drawn  from   a  relatively 


Iviii  INTRODUCTION 

old  tradition.  In  the  case  of  others  we  may  help  ourselves  by  the 
hypothesis  that  a  Christian  community  existed  in  Jerusalem  even 
after  the  destruction  of  the  city,  and  that  it  continued  to  rnove  on 
the  old  lines.  But  we  must  also  reckon  with  the  possibility  that 
Matthew  kept  to  the  form  of  the  tradition  of  the  community  of 
Jerusalem  of  set  purpose,  even  though  he  occasionally  destroyed 
it'  (Einleitung,  p.  88).  Thus  Wellhausen's  scepticism  leads  him 
to  more  than  one  dubious  hypothesis. 


§  23.     Loisy  on  Matthew. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  narratives  which  are  peculiar  to 
Matthew  have  rarely,  if  ever,  any  historical  value.  As  Loisy 
observes  :  '  They  have  rather  the  character  of  legendary  develop- 
ments than  of  truly  traditional  recollections.'  The  desire  to  find 
fulfilments  of  O.T.  predictions  or  allusions  in  the  life  of  Jesus 
has  led  to  the  creation  of  incidents  of  which  it  is  '  unnecessary  to 
observe  that  the  historic  value  is  nil.'  Especially  in  the  chapters 
which  deal  with  the  birth  of  Jesus  is  the  influence  of  O.T.  pro- 
phecies most  noticeable.  'II  ne  semble  pas  que  ces  r^cits  aient 
le  moindre  fondement  historique.'  Loisy  regards  it  as  probable 
that  the  wide  deflection  of  the  birth  and  infancy  narratives  from 
historic  reality  and  probability  makes  it  likely  that  they  and  the 
Gospel  of  which  they  form  part,  'acquired  their  essential  traits 
outside  Palestine  and  the  Jewish-Christian  communities  of  that 
country,  in  a  land  where,  and  at  a  time  when,  no  eyewitness  of,  or 
even  well-informed  person  about,  the  life  of  Jesus  existed'  (E.  S.  I. 
pp.  140,  141).  The  author  'knew  Hebrew,  but  had  in  view  readers 
who  did  not.  He  was  probably  bom  a  Jew,  but  he  was  not  of 
Palestine :  he  wrote  in  the  East,  perhaps  in  Asia  Minor,  or  rather 
in  Syria :  by  origin  Jewish-Christian,  he  has  a  universalist  spirit, 
though  without  polemical  arriere-pensee  in  favour  of  Paul  or 
against  the  Galilsean  apostles :  he  unifies  the  apostolic  tradition 
and  regards  the  apostles  as  a  sacred  group  of  whom  Peter  is  in 
some  sort  the  representative;  he  neutralizes  the  efifect  of  the 
Judaizing  sayings  he  quotes  by  a  symbolic  interpretation  of  them. 
To  those  who  wished  to  advocate  Jewish  observances  and  hve 
without  rules  he  opposed  the  perfection  of  the  Christian  Law.  A 
man  of  tradition,  one  might  even  say,  a  man  of  the  Church,  he 
wrote  a  Gospel  truly  churchly  and  catholic  :  one  might  be  almost 
tempted  to  see  in  him,  if  not  one  of  the  first  bishops,  at  least  one 
of  those  venerable  personages  who  as  elders  or  overseers  governed 
those  communities  in  which  germinated  the  institution"  of  that 
monarchic  episcopacy  which  was  the  heir  and  successor  of  its 


INTKODUCTION  lix 

apostolic  forerunner.  His  book  may  be  ascribed  to  somewhere 
near  the  year  lOO ;  it  can  not  be  much  earlier  or  much  later ' 
{E.  8. 1,  p.  143). 

§  24.     Renan  on  Matthew. 

It  is  perhaps  undesirable  or  unnecessary  to  say  much  more  in 
a  brief  Introduction  such  as  this  about  the  Gospel  of  Matthew. 
Those  who  do  not  know  them  already  may  be  strongly  recom- 
mended to  read  Chapters  x.  and  xi.  of  Kenan's  Les  £jvangiles,  in 
which  there  are  a  number  of  remarks  about  Matthew,  his  relation 
to  Mark,  and  the  comparative  authenticity  of  the  sayings  which 
he  attributes  to  Jesus,  full  of  suggestiveness  and  expressed  in  the 
most  delightful  and  exquisite  of  styles.  What  can  be  better  than 
this  about  the  double  character  of  Matthew,  his  combination  of 
opposites  ?  '  L'lllvangile  de  saint  Matthieu,  comme  presque  toutes  J 
les  compositions  fines,  a  et6  I'ouvrage  d'une  conscience  en  quelque 
sorte  double,  L'auteur  est  k  la  fois  juif  et  chr^tien ;  sa  nouvelle 
foi  n'a  pas  tud  I'ancienne  et  ne  lui  a  rien  ot^  de  sa  poesie.  II 
aime  deux  choses  en  mdme  temps....La  Loi  subsiste-t-elle  ?  Oui 
et  non.  J^sus  la  d^truit  et  I'accomplit.  Le  sabbat,  il  le  supprime 
et  le  maintient.  Les  c^r^raonies  juives,  il  les  observe  et  ne  veut 
pas  qu'on  y  tienne'  (pp.  209,  210).  Or  this  about  the  difficulty 
of  saying  which  of  the  speeches  and  parables  were  really  said 
by  Jesus  and  which  were  not.  '  La  Vie  de  J6sus  et  I'histoire 
de  la  redaction  des  ]6vangiles  sont  deux  sujets  qui  se  p^n^trent  de 
telle  sorte  qu'il  faut  laisser  entre  eux  la  limite  indecise,  au  risque 
de  paraitre  se  contredire.  En  reality  cette  contradiction  est  de 
peu  de  consequence.  J^sus  est  le  veritabLe  cr^ateurdeT^angile ; 
J6sus  a  tout  fait,  m^me  ce  qu'on  lui  a  pritiTsaTlegendB  et  lui- 
mSme  sont  inseparables :  il  fut  tellement  identifi^  avec  son  idee, 
que  son  idee  devint  lui-m§me,  I'absorba,  fit  de  sa  biographie  ce 
qu'elle  devait  Stre'  (p.  204).  And  so  on  with  much  more  of 
admirable  mingling  together  of  paradox  and  truth,  or  rather  of 
truth  made  more  visible  by  the  paradox  of  its  form.  Or  lastly, 
what  can  be  more  suggestive  or  thought-provoking  than  the 
sentences  about  the  impression  made  upon  us  by  the  book  as  a 
whole  ?  '  L'efifet  g^ndral  est  celui  d'un  palais  de  f^es,  construit  J 
tout  entier  en  pierres  lumineuses'  (p.  198).  Loisy  is,  I  think,  too 
depreciative  in  his  estimate  of  Matthew's  style  and  manner  and 
power  of  story-telling  {E.  S.  I.  p.  259),  while  Burkitt's  ascription 
to  him  of  '  great  literary  skill  ancLdignity '  scarcely  seems  to  hit 
the  nail  precisely  on  the  head.  IsT^oETlenan  perhaps  nearer 
doing  so  when  he  calls  Matthew's  Gospel  'un  chef  d'ceuyre  de 
litterateur   populaire  ? . . .  Un   genie  adrien  qu'on' tou'che,   qu'on 


Ix  INTRODUCTION 

1  emlDrasse,  mais  qui  ne  se  heurte  jamais  aux  cailloux  du  chemin 
!nous  parle,  nous  ravit.  On  ne  s'arrete  pas  h  se  demander  sil 
isait  ce  qu'il  nous  raconte.  II  ne  doute  de  rien  et  ne  sait  nen. 
I  C'est  un  charme  analogue  a  celui  de  I'affirmation  de  la  femme,  qui 
uous  fait  sourire  et  nous  subjugue'  (p.  198). 

§  25.     The  Gospel  of  Luke  and  its  sources. 

The  Gospel  of  Luke  is  the  longest  of  the  three  Synoptics. 
It  contains  some  114.6  verses,  whereas  Matthew  contains  about 
1 07 1.  It  has  also  the  largest  amount  of  matter  peculiar  to  itself. 
Among  this  matter  are  several  of  the  most  beautiful  of  the 
parables.  Some  of  these  parables  seem  not  merely  very  worthy 
of  Jesus,  which  is  an  unsafe  criterion,  but  on  general  grounds 
likely  to  belong  to  him.  For  this  and  for  other  reasons  we  must 
not  be  too  hasty  in  assuming  that  what  is  peculiar  to  Luke 
can  not  have  been  said  by  Jesus. 

Luke  opens  with  a  short  but  highly  interesting  preface,  in 
which  the  author  speaks  of  his  own  position  and  object.  He  was 
no  eyewitness  or  apostle ;  he  writes  upon  the  basis,  and  with  the 
help,  of  many  who  have  preceded  him.  Thus  he,  too,  wrote  at  a 
period  when  many  written  sources  existed,  though  in  his  case,  as 
in  Matthew's,  the  two  most  important  of  those  sources  were 
probably  Mark  and  Q.  Still,  we  must  assume  that  his  pecuhar 
matter  is  not  mainly  his  own  composition,  but  usually  rests  upon 
sources,  the  exact  number  and  nature  of  which  can  no  longer  be 
convincingly  ascertained. 

The  question  of  the  sources  which  are  peculiar  to  Luke  is 
being  much  discussed  at  the  present  time,  but,  so  far,  no  generally 
accepted  conclusions  have  been  arrived  at.  The  question  is  very 
important  for  many  reasons,  not  all  of  which  I  can  mention  here. 
It  is,  however,  obvious,  inasmuch  as  Luke  contains  a  large  number 
of  parables  (some  thirteen)  and  of  sayings  which  are  not  found 
except  in  his  Gospel,  that  if  it  could  be  ascertained  or  cogently 
inferred  that  all  or  most  of  them  came  from  one  or  two  early 
sources,  the  degree  of  authenticity  to  be  ascribed  to  them  would 
be  considerably  increased.  And  in  addition  to  the  parables  and 
sayings  there  is  the  narrative.  Here,  too,  there  is  a  number  of 
extra  stories  and  incidents,  while  some  incidents  recorded  by 
Mark  are  recorded  differently'  and  with  varying  touches  by  Luke. 
Especially  is  this  the  case  in  the  story  of  the  Passion,  where, 
moreover,  these  special  touches  of  Luke  sometimes  seem  to  show 
in  themselves  indications  of  greater  historical  probability.  If 
these   touches  and  the  extra  parables  were  due  to  one  and  the 


INTRODUCTION  Ixi 

same  source,  might  not  that  source  be  one  of  the  best  and  earliest 
documents  now  embedded  or  drawn  upon  in  the  three  Synoptic 
Gospels?  Such,  then,  is  the  character  and  significance  of  the 
problems  raised  by  the  special  sources  of  Luke. 

§  26.     B.  Weiss  and  Loisy  on  the  sources  of  Luke. 

A  thorough  investigation  of  Luke's  sources  has  recently  been 
carried  through  by  B.  Weiss.  It  is  very  doubtful  whether  his 
conclusions  as  a  whole  will  stand  the  test  of  time.  In  one  sense  it 
may  be  said  that  they  simplify  the  problem  too  much,  and  that 
they  do  not  sufficiently  allow  for  the  '  many '  sources  which  Luke 
may  not  only  have  known,  but  also  used.  According  to  B.  Weiss 
Luke  used  three  sources  only — Mark,  Q,  and  a  third  source,  which 
Weiss  calls  L.  To  this  third  source  B.  Weiss  assigns  a  very  con- 
siderable quantity  of  the  Gospel,  beginning  from  the  first  chapter 
and  ending  with  the  last.  The  first  two  chapters  (excluding  the 
prologue)  he  practically  ascribes  to  L  entirely,  and  the  same  may 
be  said  for  the  entire  story  of  the  Passion  and  the  resurrection 
contained  in  the  last  three  chapters  (with  the  exception  of  some 
18  verses  in  chapter  xxii.).  Of  the  intervening  chapters  from  iii. 
to  xxii.  inclusive,  which  contain  some  834  verses  in  all,  Weiss 
assigns  346  to  L,  or  a  little  more  than  two-fifths.  And  this  source 
he  regards  as  very  old,  of  Judseo-Christian  origin,  and  extremely 
trustworthy  and  '  authentic' 

Thus  Luke  would  be  the  most  valuable  and  important  of  the 
three  Synoptics,  containing  as  it  would  large  portions  of  three  such 
early  and  trustworthy  sources  as  Mark,  Q,  and  L. 

I  fancy  that  the  severe  scrutiny  of  scholars  will  upset  a  con- 
siderable portion  of  these  conclusions.  The  naive  and  childlike 
confidence  reposed  in  the  accuracy  of  the  narratives  of  the  birth 
and  infancy  in  chapters  i.  and  ii.  has  justly  aroused  the  wonder  of 
Harnack,  disposed  though  the  great  theologian  is  in  other  points 
to  allow  great  importance  and  value  to  Weiss's  researches.  And 
even  putting  these  chapters  aside  (and  for  our  purposes  they  are 
the  least  interesting  and  important  portion  of  the  entire  book), 
there  is,  I  think,  grave  doubt  whether  Weiss  has  not  ascribed  too 
much  to  one  and  the  same  source.  It  is  doubtful — though  the 
matter  can  not  be  gone  into  here — whether  there  is  sufiicient 
linguistic  and  other  evidence  to  justify  Weiss's  amazing  confidence 
and  assurance.  It  is  still  more  doubtful  whether  the  incidents  and 
narratives  assigned  to  L  are  really  due  to  the  same  source  as  the 
parables  and  sayings  assigned  to  him.  The  parables  and  sayings 
seem  in  many  cases  much  older  than  the  incidents  and  narratives. 


kii  INTRODUCTION 

Moreover  Weiss's  theory  is  extremely  complicated.  Not  all  of 
the  material  peculiar  to  Luke  does  he  assign  to  L.  Some  of  it 
(including  five  parables)  he  assigns  to  Q  (about  6o  verses  in  all). 
But,  on  the  other  hand,  he  believes  that  the  L  material  in  Luke 
includes  a  considerable  quantity  of  parallels  to  Q.  To  this  extent 
Weiss,  as  it  were,  makes  some  concession  to  the  arguments  of 
Mr  Allen,  for  he  holds  that  we  can  discover  in  Luke  the  use  of  the 
same  oral  tradition  in  two  distinct  sources,  Q  and  L.  And  not 
only  to  Q  does  he  discover  parallels,  but  even,  in  a  few  passages, 
to  Mark.  The  particular  cases  where  these  parallels  are  assumed 
will  mostly  be  indicated  in  the  commentary. 

Quite  opposed  to  the  theory  of  Weiss,  on  which  I  will  not 
longer  dwell  (for  the  character  and  peculiarities  of  the  hypothetical 
source  L  are  as  yet,  at  any  rate,  too  uncertain  and  hypothetical  to 
discuss  in  a  popular  work  of  this  kind),  are  the  analysis  and  con- 
clusions of  Loisy.  He  also  seems  to  me  not  to  allow  enough 
margin  for  the  many  sources  which  Luke  may  have  known  and 
used.  His  view  is  that  all  the  parables  and  almost  all  the  sayings 
which  are  peculiar  to  Luke  were  taken  by  that  Evangelist  from  Q. 
One  seems  to  see  in  Loisy — though  perhaps  I  am  wrong  here — an 
unconscious  desire  to  keep  for  Jesus  as  many  of  the  parables  and 
sayings  as  he  possibly  can.  As  Q  and  the  narrative  source  of 
Mark  are  the  oldest  sources  of  the  Gospels,  the  more  sayings  and 
parables  that  can  be  allocated  to  Q,  the  more  of  them  are  likely  to 
be  authentic.  It  is,  however,  to  be  doubted  whether  Loisy  has 
sufficiently  taken  into  account  the  peculiar  character  of  many  of 
Luke's  special  parables  which  (together  with  a/ew  of  the  incidents) 
seems  to  set  them  into  a  special  class  by  themselves,  and  to  suggest 
for  them  a  special  source. 

For  the  incidents  peculiar  to  Luke  Loisy  admits  a  special 
source  in  three  or  four  cases.  In  others,  again,  he  (rightly,  I 
think)  holds  that  we  must  look  to  the  inventiveness  of  the 
Evangelist.  In  yet  a  third  class  (notably  for  the  story  of  the 
Passion)  he  believes  that  the  special  source  is  none  other  than 
the  narrative  source  of  Mark  which  the  Evangelist,  as  it  were, 
occasionally  consulted  and  drew  upon  as  well  as  Mark. 


§  27.     Date  of  Luke.     The  '  great  insertion! 

The  date  of  Luke  is  assigned  by  most  scholars  to  about  the 
same  period  as  Matthew,  namely,  90-100  a.d.  It  has  been 
supposed  by  some  that  Matthew  knew  Luke's  Gospel,  by  others 
that  Luke  knew  Matthew's.  It  seems  more  probable  that  neither 
knew  of  the  other's.     Which  is  earlier  ?     As  to  this  point,  too, 


INTRODUCTION  Ixiii 

opinions  vary,  and  this  is  not  wonderful,  for  the  evidence  is  con- 
flicting. For  instance,  the  bits  taken  by  both  Evangelists  from  Q 
sometimes  appear  in  an  earlier  form  in  Luke  and  sometimes  in 
Matthew.  The  additions  and  accretions  to  them  seem  sometimes 
more  developed  and  significant  in  Luke,  and  sometimes  in 
Matthew.  Loisy's  general  view  is  that  'in  preserving  a  larger 
number  of  sayings  in  separate  places  (d  l'6tat  dispersd)  Luke  has 
doubtless  kept  to  the  order  of  the  old  Logia  better  than  Matthew, 
but,  like  Matthew,  he  has  not  refrained  from  additions,  touchings 
up  and  curtailments.  Sometimes  he  abbreviates,  sometimes 
he  paraphrases,  sometimes  he  separates,  sometimes  he  brings 
together.  On  the  whole  he  seems  to  have  respected  the  text  of 
his  source  less  than  Matthew'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  165).  As  regards  the  use 
which  the  first  and  third  Evangelists  make  of  the  second,  we  may 
observe  one  highly  curious  and  notable  feature  in  Luke.  He 
follows  Mark  in  his  order  of  events  fairly  closely  up  to  the  end  of 
Mark's  ninth  chapter.  In  spite  of  various  insertions  from  Q  or 
other  sources  he  never  leaves  Mark  for  long  together.  But  at  this 
point  he  makes  a  huge  intercalation,  and  leaves  Mark  altogether 
for  several  chapters,  namely  from  ix.  51  to  xviii.  14.  Jesus  during 
this  intercalation  is  supposed  to  be  journeying  from  Galilee  to 
Jerusalem.  At  xviii.  1 5  Luke  resumes  his  excerpts  from  Mark,  very 
nearly  where  he  had  left  them  off.  In  this  huge  intercalation  he 
places  much  of  the  matter  which  is  peculiar  to  himself.  And  he 
has  a  peculiar  view  of  how  Jesus  journeyed  to  Jerusalem.  Mark 
makes  him  go  through  Peraea  on  the  '  other  side '  of  Jordan ;  Luke 
makes  him  pass  through  Samaria.  Some  few  words  about  the 
great  intercalation  will  be  read  in  the  commentary.  The  cause 
and  meaning  of  it  are  obscure,  and  no  satisfactory  explanation  has, 
so  far,  been  given.  It  is  perhaps  the  simplest  hypothesis  to  suppose 
that  Luke  put  in  his  big  insertion  the  majority  of,  those  sayings, 
parables  and  anecdotes  for  which  his  sources  afforded  him  no 
indication  of  place  or  time.  Almost  all  the  sayings  and  parables 
peculiar  to  him  are  to  be  found  in  the  insertion,  together  also  with 
a  certain  amount  of  Q  material  common  to  him  and  to  Matthew, 
which  Matthew  has  placed  and  grouped  in  other  connections.  On 
the  other  hand,  in  some  passages  Luke  keeps  more  closely  to  the 
text  of  Mark  than  does  Matthew.  Dr  Carpenter  writes  cautiously: 
'  Matthew  in  its  present  contents  is  presumably  the  latest  of  the 
three.'  Wellhausen,  on  the  other  hand,  takes  with  his  usual  con- 
fidence the  opposite  view.  In  many  incidents  and  conceptions  he 
thinks  that  Luke  shows  a  later  stage  of  development  than 
Matthew.  So,  too,  Wellhausen  also  notes  a  certain  '  inwardness ' 
and  individualization  in  Luke,  which,  with  other  things,  points 
forward  to  the  still  later  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel.    In  the  story 


Ixiv  INTRODUCTION 

of  the  Passion,  with  certain  elements  that  seem  older  or  more 
historic  than  anything  in  Mark,  there  are  others  which  point  to  a 
later  stage  than  Matthew.  So  too  in  the  story  of  the  resurrection. 
These  indications  of  later  date  will  be  alluded  to  in  the  com- 
mentary. 

§  28.     Luke's  Gentile  point  of  view:   his  sympathy  for  'sinners' 
and  the  poor :  the  authenticity  of  his  special  material :  his  date. 

If  Matthew  is  perhaps  written  from  a  Jewish-Christian  point 
of  view,  Luke  is  undoubtedly  written  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
Gentile.  Not  that  there  is  much  or  any  distinctive  Paulinism  in 
this  Gospel,  or  a  marked  antagonism  to  the  Law.  Thus  Loisy  justly 
remarks  of  the  author  of  the  third  Gospel:  'he  is  not  interested  in 
the  essential  theology  of  Paul;  one  might  almost  say  that  he 
ignores  it ;  he  is  not  anxious,  like  the  redactor  of  Mark,  to  defend 
the  person  of  the  great  apostle  and  to  make  his  ideas  prevail  in 
the  gospel  tradition;  in  certain  very  characteristic  passages 
(notably  in  xxii.  24-27)  he  neglects  the  Pauline  additions  of  Mark 
and  keeps  to  the  primitive  statements'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  173).  'Really 
and  truly,'  says  Jtilicher,  '  Luke  did  not  take  over  from  Paul  more 
than  that  which  the  Church  as  a  whole  took  over  from  him,  to 
wit,  the  idea  of  the  universality  of  salvation,  and  the  conception 
of  the  boundlessness  of  the  divine  grace'  {Einleitung,  p.  292). 

But  Luke's  universalism  has  no  polemic  tinge.  He  has  not  to 
combat  any  specifically  Judseo-Christian  view. 

He  is  a  'universalist'  in  a  quite  simple  sense,  as  to  the  manner 
born.  Though  Luke  preserves  from  his  source  sentences  which 
might  seem  to  show  the  contrary,  he  himself  has  apparently  little 
knowledge  of,  interest  in,  or  sympathy  for,  specifically  Jewish 
considerations.  He  is  unacquainted  with  Hebrew,  and  the  geo- 
graphy of  Palestine  is  unfamiliar  to  him.  Jesus  sends  his  seventy 
disciples  directly  and  emphatically  to  the  Gentiles.  The  twelve 
apostles  symbolize  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  but  the  seventy 
correspond  with  and  symbolize  the  Jewish  idea  of  the  seventy 
nations  of  the  world.  More  will  be  said  of  this  in  the  notes. 
A  further  noticeable  feature  of  Luke's  Gospel  is  his  marked 
sympathy  for  that  side  of  the  teaching  and  life  of  Jesus  which  had 
to  do  with  sinners  and  the  poor.  A  'tinge  of  asceticism'  (Burkitt, 
p.  214)  pervades  his  Gospel  (though  this, — at  least  as  regards  the 
source  L, — is  warmly  denied  by  Weiss).  For  the  repentant  sinner 
he  has  profound  pity.  Some  of  the  finest  stories,  parables,  and 
sayings  which  illustrate  the  compassion  and  love  wnich  Jesus 
showed,  and  which  God  feels,  for  the  sinner  who  repents,  are 


INTRODUCTION  Ixv 

peculiar  to  Luke.  Peculiar  also  to  him  are  his  sympathy  for  the 
poor  and  needy,  and  his  somewhat  accentuated  antagonism  to  the 
rich.  He  has,  as  Loisy  observes,  'une  certaine  note  psychologique, 
un  sens  profondL  des  choses  de  I'^me,  un  ton  p6n^tr^,  ce  je  ne  sais 
quoi  qui  vient  du  coeur  et  qui  touche  le  cceur'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  260). 
He  is  fond  of  contrasts  in  pairs.  Thus  we  have  the  contrasts  of 
Martha  and  Mary,  Pharisee  and  Publican,  the  rich  man  and 
Lazarus,  and  so  on.  Wellhausen  concisely  says :  '  The  main  type 
and  antitype  which  these  pairs  provide  is  that  of  the  self-con- 
scious righteous  and  the  humble  sinner,  and  the  favourite  theme 
is  that  repentance  is  possible  for  all,  whatever  their  situation  and 
circumstances,  that  it  is  necessary  for  everyone,  and  that  it  is 
easier  for  the  ne'er-do-well  than  for  the  virtuous.  Luke  has 
a  marked  affection  not  merely  for  the  despised  and  degraded 
"  crowd,"  but  also  for  outcast  individuals.  He  presses  the  saying 
that  the  sick,  not  the  healthy,  need  the  doctor'  {Einleitung, 
p.  69).  Luke,  as  Kenan  has  said,  is  pre-eminently  the  Gospel  of 
forgiveness.  Conversion  is  possible  for  all.  It  is  also  pre-eminently 
the  Gospel  of  humility.  And  the  greatest  of  the  virtues  is  alms- 
giving. Not,  however,  in  a  Pauline  sense  is  Kenan  justified  in 
calling  Luke  the  Gospel  of  pardon  obtained  by  faith.  Harnack 
points  out  the  grave  difference,  in  spite  of  his  insistence  upon  the 
accuracy  of  the  traditional  authorship.  Luke's  '  faith '  is  less  dog- 
matic and  profound,  and  his  philanthropy  is  less  limited  and 
reserved  {Lukas  der  Arzt,  p.  100).  There  is  a  certain  family 
likeness  which  runs  through  the  stories  and  parables  peculiar  to 
Luke,  and  Wellhausen  is  perhaps  right  in  saying:  'may  their 
value  be  as  great  as  you  please,  nevertheless  these  special  portions 
{diese  Novellen)  of  Luke  cannot  be  put  on  the  same  level  (of  authen- 
ticity) as  the  products  of  the  old  tradition '  {Einleitung,  p.  70). 

Naturally  a  good  deal  depends  upon  the  question  whether  the 
peculiar  matter  found  only  in  Luke  comes  from  some  old  and 
trustworthy  source.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  as  regards  many 
of  the  special  sayings  and  parables  this  is  indeed  true.  Even 
though  these  sayings  and  parables  may  have  been  originally  said 
(in  a  more  primitive  form)  by  Jesus,  yet  we  can  imagine  a  collec- 
tion of  sayings  and  parables  in  which  one  particular  aspect  of 
Jesus's  teaching  was  specially  emphasized.  And  this  seems  to 
have  been  the  case  as  regards  his  teaching  about  forgiveness  and 
humility,  the  poor  and  the  rich,  and  the  boundlessness  of  the  divine 
mercy.  Such  stories,  sayings  and  parables  as  those  contained  in 
vii.  36-50,  X.  29-37,  XV.  11-32,  xvi.  19-31,  xii.  15-21,  xvii.  9-14, 
do  seem  to  have  a  certain  character  in  common,  and  may  be  due 
to  a  common  source.  Nevertheless  this  source  would  faithfully 
reflect — as  it  seems  to   me — one  aspect  of  the   character  and 


Ixvi  INTRODUCTION 

teaching  of  Jesus.  That  aspect  of  the  Master  in  which  he 
appears  as  the  friend  of  tax-collectors  and  sinners  is  prominent 
in  Luke,  and  this  prominence  may  be  due  to  a  special  source. 
This  hypothesis  is  strongly  pressed  by  Bacon.  It  is  the  '  special 
source  of  Luke'  which  gives  us  a  'constant'  (yet  historic) 
'depiction  of  Jesus  as  the  champion  of  the  "little  ones,"  the 
unrecognized  "sons''  or  "daughters  of  Abraham,"  the  spiritually 
disinherited  masses,  publicans,  women,  Samaritans,  outcasts  from 
the  Synagogue,  scattered  sheep,  lost  sons'  (op.  dt.  p.  xxxvii.). 
There  is,  I  think,  a  good  deal  of  truth  in  this,  though  whether 
there  existed  anything  resembling  'spiritually  disinherited  masses' 
is  open  to  the  very  gravest  doubt.  On  this  point  Bacon  is  still 
under  the  spell  of  the  old  authorities  and  the  old  ideas.  But 
apart  from  this  special  point,  we  may  hold  to  a  good  deal  of  what 
is  said  by  the  American  professor. 

As  regards  the  universalism  of  Luke,  on  the  other  hand,  that 
seems  neither  to  go  back  to  his  sources  nor  to  Jesus.  B.  Weiss 
observes:  'von  einer  Heidenmission  ist  in  L  so  wenig  die  Rede 
wie  in  Q.'  The  special  sayings  and  parables  do  not  touch  the 
question  of  universalism  one  way  or  the  other,  and  as  to  the  good 
Samaritan  there  is  much  reason  to  suppose  (though  no  Christian 
commentator  is  likely  to  admit  it)  that  he  comes  from  a  verbal 
alteration  of  the  original  story.  The  universalism  of  Luke  is  due 
to  himself.  He  is  ever  ready  to  use  or  adapt  a  traditional  story 
for  symbolic  and  universalist  purposes. 

The  third  Evangelist,  then,  is  '  a  Gentile  writing  for  Gentiles.' 
Do  we  know  who  he  was  more  precisely  ?  From  very  old  times 
the  Gospel  has  been  attributed  to  Luke,  the  '  beloved  physician ' 
and  the  friend  of  Paul  mentioned  in  Colossians  iv.  14.  If  this 
Epistle  is  genuine,  which  is  very  doubtful,  Luke  might  have 
written  the  Gospel  about  80  or  90  A.D.  This  is  the  opinion  of  the 
great  theologian  Harnack,  who  has  written  a  book  to  prove  that 
Luke  was  the  author  of  both  the  Gospel  and  the  Acts.  In  this 
conclusion  Harnack  adopts  the  view  of  most  English  conservative 
theologians,  and  especially  it  may  be  noted  that  he  too  maintains 
that  there  is  linguistic  evidence  to  show  that  the  author  was  a 
physician.  Harnack 's  contention  is,  however,  far  from  being  con- 
clusively proved.  And  it  may  be  gravely  questioned  whether 
80  A.D.  is  not  somewhat  too  early  a  date  for  Acts  as  well  as  for 
Luke.  Nevertheless  it  is  possible  that  if  Luke  was  born  about 
30,  he  could  have  written  the  Gospel  as  late  as  100.  This  is  the 
view  of  Professor  Burkitt,  who  believes  in  the  traditional  author- 
ship, but  holds  that  Luke  had  read  and  used  Josephus,  and  that 
his  book  was  written  about  100  A.D.  As  the  date  is  in  any  case 
much  the  same,  the  question  of  the  authorship  is  for  our  purposes 


INTRODUCTION  Ixvii 

of  very  secondary  importance.  The  likelihood  of  the  authenticity 
of  its  special  material  is  neither  increased  nor  diminished.  And 
the  importance  and  beauty  of  the  third  Evangelist's  book  are 
largely  independent  of  its  exact  date.  A  distinguished  classical 
scholar  once  observed  to  me  that  of  the  three  Synoptists  Luke 
seemed  to  him  to  have  the  'keenest  and  deepest  appreciation  of 
the  humanity  and  divinity  of  Jesus.'  (The  speaker  did  not  mean 
divinity  in  the  sense  of  deity.)  This  may  be  rightly  said  and 
finely  observed,  and  even  if  Luke's  Novellen  are  not  authentic, 
they  may  nevertheless  be  truly  illustrative  of  the  genuine  spirit 
of  the  Galilsean  teacher. 

Each  of  the  first  three  Gospels  has  thus  its  own  specific  interest 
and  importance. 


§  29.     The  relation  of  '  date '  to  '  authenticity.' 

It  may,  however,  be  observed  in  passing  that  the  authenticity 
of  a  given  saying  of  Jesus  or  of  a  particular  incident  about  his 
ministry  is  not  to  be  merely  measured,  or  always  chiefly  measured, 
by  the  supposed  date  of  the  '  source '  which  records  it.  Here  one 
must  bear  in  mind  those  considerations  to  which  Julicher  in  his 
Neue  Linien  has  again  rightly  called  attention.  It  does  not  follow, 
he  argues,  that  a  given  passage  is  authentic  in  direct  proportion 
to  its  age.  Even  if,  for  example,  Q,  or  '  the  special  source '  of 
Luke,  were  always  younger  than  Mark,  it  would  not  necessarily 
follow  that  some  parts  of  Q,  or  of  the  special  source  of  Luke, 
might  not  be  more  authentic  than  some  parts  of  Mark.  The  point 
is:  where  would  tradition  remember  truly,  and  where  would  it, 
unconsciously  or  consciously,  add,  alter,  and  embroider  ?  Is  not 
Julicher  right  when  he  says  that  what  must  be  looked  at  with 
most  suspicion  should  be  'those  sections  of  the  Gospels  which 
deal  with  the  appraisement  of  the  person  of  Jesus  and  with  the 
representation  of  his  self-consciousness'?  ('die  direkt  auf  die 
Schiitzung  der  Person  Jesu  und  die  Darstellung  seines  Selbstbe- 
wusstseins  beziiglichen  Partien ')  (p.  73).  If  this  be  so,  we  shall 
be  disposed  to  regard  as  more  presumably  authentic  those  words  of 
Jesus  in  which  he  does  not  speak  of  his  own  powers,  or  of  himself, 
or  of  his  future.  We  shall  be  disposed  to  regard  those  doings 
of  Jesus  as  more  presumably  authentic  which  are  not  specially 
Messianic  or  specially  miraculous  or  specially  in  accordance  with 
the  later  beliefs  of  the  Christian  disciples,  as  they  were  rapidly 
formed  between  30  and  60  A.D.  Over  the  Messianic  consciousness 
of  Jesus,  and  over  those  words  and  deeds  of  his  which  betray  it,  a 
dai'k  shadow  of  doubt  must  continue  to  hover.     We  cannot  get 


Ixviii  INTRODUCTION 

beyond  the  Jesus  •  des  altesten  Gemeindeglaubens ' — the  Jesus  as 
the  faith  of  the  earliest  community  conceived  him.  Old  history 
and  new  faith  are  fused  together ;  the  picture  of  Jesus,  which  the 
Synoptics  show,  has  not  only  many  painful  gaps,  but  is  throughout 
covered  with  a  varnish  which  here  and  there  does  not  allow  any- 
thing of  the  original  to  shine  through  {Neue  Linien  in  der  Kritik 
der  evangelischen  Ueberlieferwng,  p.  71).  Just  where  we  most 
want  to  know,  we  must  always  be  content  to  conjecture. 


§  30.     The  condition  of  the  Jews  during  the  age  of  Jesits. 

Jesus  was  born  in  the  year  4  B.C.  or  perhaps  a  year  or  two 
earlier.  He  died  probably  in  30  A.D.  The  Gospels  of  Mark, 
Matthew,  and  Luke  were  compiled,  as  we  have  seen,  between  the 
years  70  and  lOO  A.D.  It  is,  therefore,  desirable  for  those  who 
read  these  books  to  know  something  about  the  history  of  the 
Jews  during  that  period  of  100  years.  Something  ought  to  be 
known  of  the  external  history ;  something  of  the  internal  condition. 
But  this  knowledge  cannot  be  given  here ;  it  must  be  sought  else- 
where. 

Jesus's  birth  falls  in  the  last  years  or  even  year  of  the  reign  of 
Herod  the  Great.  The  fortunes  and  deeds  of  this  remarkable 
man  should  be  read  in  Josephus.  He  exercised,  we  have  to 
remember,  a  kind  of  quasi-independent  rule  under  the  overlord- 
ship  of  Rome.  When  he  died  his  territories  were  divided.  His 
son  Archelaus  received,  and  was  confirmed  by  Augustus  in  the 
possession  of,  Judsea,  Idumsea,  and  Samaria.  He  was  not  called 
king,  but  ethnarch.  A  second  son,  Antipas  or  Herod  Antipas, 
often  merely  called  Herod  in  the  Gospels,  was  given  Galilee  and 
Peraea.  His  title  was  that  of  tetrarch,  '  a  title  which  was  often 
used  for  rulers  of  a  divided  kingdom  without  reference  to  its 
precise  etymology.'  In  the  Gospels  he  is  sometimes  called  king, 
but  this  is  technically  an  error.  Another  son  of  Herod  called 
Philip  received  some  more  north-eastern  portions  of  Palestine, 
which  had  been  attached  to  Herod's  dominions  by  Augustus. 
The  town  of  Csesarea  Philippi  was  in  the  territory  of  Philip. 

The  reign  of  Archelaus  did  not  last  long.  He  seems  to  have 
ruled  with  harshness  and  cruelty,  and  not  to  have  possessed  his 
father's  ability  for  extricating  himself  from  a  difiScult  situation. 
So  when  the  Jews  complained  of  him  to  Augustus,  and  he  had  to 
appear  at  Rome,  his  defence  was  not  accepted,  and  he  was  deposed 
and  banished  (6  A.D.).  Henceforth,  with  one  brief  interval,  Judaea 
and  Sama;ria  were  directly  administered  by  Rome.  There  was  a 
Roman  Procurator  whose  headquarters  were  usually  at  Gajsarea. 


INTEOBUCTION  Isix 

Above  him  in  rank  and  authority  was  the  Legate  or  Governor  of 
the  province  of  Syria;  he  was  of  senatorial  rank,  whereas  the 
Procurator  was  only  a  'knight.'  Thus  Judaea  during  the  life  of 
Jesus  was  under  the  direct  authority  of  Eome,  although  a  certain 
measure  of  home  rule  was  still  allowed.  The  Sanhedrin  was 
apparently  not  only  the  highest  legal  court,  but  the  high  priest's 
council  of  government.  The  high  priest  presided ;  his  influence 
was  predominant.  But  the  power  to  inflict  and  carry  out  the 
death  sentence  had  been  removed  from  this  native  court  by  the 
Romans.  The  Jews  were  eager  to  regain  the  power,  and  illegal 
executions  were  not  unknown.  In  Galilee,  on  the  other  hand, 
Herod  Antipas  occupied  the  place  of  the  Roman  administrator 
in  Judaea.  His  reign  continued  till  after  the  death  of  Jesus. 
Ultimately  (39  A.D.)  he  too  was  bereft  by  Caligula  of  his  tetrarchy 
and  banished  to  Lyons. 


§  31.     The  Law  and  the  State:   classes  of  the  people: 
Rahhis  and  Pharisees. 

It  is  very  difficult  to  form  any  adequate  or  accurate  picture  of 
Jewish  life  in  the  first  half  of  the  first  century  a.d.  A  condition 
of  things  existed  which  in  many  respects  was  very  different  from 
anything  which  has  existed  since.  Moreover,  there  was  less 
homogeneity  of  conditions  then  than  afterwards.  There  must  have 
been  a  great  diversity  of  life,  of  manners,  of  opinions. 

The  history  of  the  Jews  from  the  Maccabean  revolt  till  the 
crucifixion  of  Jesus  and  the  destruction  of  the  Temple  is  a  curious 
one.  It  seems  to  show  that  the  domination  of  the  Law  was  un- 
suited  for  national  independence.  On  the  whole,  it  must  be  said, 
that  the  supremacy  of  the  Law  in  political  affairs  bred  a  good  deal 
of  fanaticism  and  tended  to  produce  a  certain  amount  of  cruelty. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  made  heroes  and  martyrs,  and  taught  men 
how  to  die  unflinchingly  for  their  ancestral  religion. 

It  is  hard  to  think  of  the  Jews  as  independent  or  as  persecuting ; 
one  can  but  think  of  them  as  persecuted.  For  1900  years  per- 
secutions in  one  form  or  another,  and  in  one  degree  or  another, 
have  been  their  recurring  lot.  After  the  fall  of  their  State  and 
the  horrors  of  the  Hadrianic  war,  they  formed  separate  and  alien 
religious  communities  in  a  hostile  environment;  they  were  despised, 
ill-treated,  mocked  at  and  abused.  Intervals  and  breathing  spaces 
there  are,  but  this  is  the  general  story.  Their  virtues  have  been 
those  of  hidden  lives  and  of  obscure  communities.  But  their 
beloved  Law  becomes  more  supreme  than  ever.  It  constitutes 
their  manhood.     It  trains  their  intellect.     It  is  their  recreation, 


Ixx  INTRODUCTION 

their  joy,  and  their  solace.  It  is  their  treasure  and  their  guide. 
There  are  practically  no  parties ;  who  would  remain  a  Jew,  if  he  did 
not  love  the  Law  ?  And  the  love  of  the  Law  expresses  itself  on 
the  same  lines :  he  who  loves  the  Law  fulfils,  or  seeks  to  fulfil,  ita 
enactments.  Rome  and  the  Church  oppress,  degrade,  torture,  and 
kill ;  the  Law  brings  poetry,  and  hope,  and  idealism,  and  God. 

Under  Herod  the  Great  and  Antipas  and  the  Procurators  too, 
the  Law  doubtless  to  some  extent  brought  these  blessings.  In 
Judaea  and  in  Galilee  during  the  years  1-30  A.D.  there  must  have 
been  many  retired,  quiet  men  and  women  who  lived  pious  lives 
according  to  the  Law  and  did  not  concern  themselves  with  politics. 
But  there  was  also  much  more.  There  were  many  other  types 
and  classes. 

For  though  the  Romans  are  the  ultimate  rulers  and  arbiters, 
a  Jewish  State  is  in  existence.  An  ecclesiastical  State  in  some 
measure ;  for  though  Herod  is  anything  rather  than  a  servant 
of  priests,  and  Antipas  is  not  the  servant  of  Rabbis,  still  the 
Pentateuch  and  its  developments  are  yet  in  large  measure  the 
Law  of  the  State.  Certainly  the  connection  of  Church  and 
State  was  not  a  happy  one  in  Judaea,  and  produced  some 
unpleasiug  results  and  characters.  We  have,  then,  to  do  with 
a  State.  Even  when  Archelaus  is  deposed,  and  Judsea  is  under 
the  administration  of  the  Roman  Procurator,  we  may  never- 
theless still  in  a  certain  sense  speak  of  a  continuing  Jewish 
State.  And,  like  every  other  State,  this  one  too  has  its  various 
parties  and  classes,  many  of  whom  largely  disappear  after  its 
destruction.  It  has  soldiers  and  politicians ;  it  has  nobles  and 
priests  and  rulers.  It  has  schemers  and  agitators.  It  has  all 
these  and  more,  and  all  of  them  either  feel  religiously — whether 
according  to  a  pure  religion  or  no,  an  outward  or  an  inward  one, 
need  not  here  be  considered — or  use  religion  for  their  own  pur- 
pose. The  national  and  political  life  was  mixed  up  with  religion 
in  a  peculiar  way,  not  wholly  to  the  advantage  either  of  the  one 
or  of  the  othei-. 

And  with  this  variety  of  classes  and  persons  there  existed,  as 
I  have  already  indicated,  a  variety  of  thought.  The  distinctions  of 
Pharisees,  Sadducees,  and  Essenes  are  familiar  to  most  people, 
yet  they  hardly  represent  with  accuracy  what  actually  existed. 
They  are  not  very  informing.  The  ruling  priests  at  Jerusalem 
seem  to  have  constituted  the  mainstay  and  chief  element  of  the 
Sadducees.  They  were  in  a  sense  conservative.  The  letter  of  the 
Law  was  enough  for  them ;  they  did  not  want  the  developments 
of  the  Rabbis.  In  doctrine  too  they  were  against  innovation. 
Thus  we  hear  that  they  would  have  nothing  to  say  to  the  doctrine 
of  the  Resurrection,  in  which  we  may  nevertheless  assert  with 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxi 

confidience  that  eleven-twelfths  of  the  nation  already  firmly- 
believed.  Many  of  these  priests,  and  many  of  the  nobles  and 
'  rulers,'  possessed,  I  should  think,  but  a  very  formal  and  outward 
religion.  We  may  compare  them  with  many  of  the  bishops, 
barons,  and  rulers  of  the  middle  ages. 

In  spite  of  the  intense  devotion  of  the  Jews  to  the  Temple, 
the  religious  teachers  of  the  people  were  not  the  priests.  The 
Temple  was  the  mark  of  the  national  life  as  well  as  the  public 
expression  of  its  religion.  Unlike  any  other  nation,  the  Jews 
offered  sacrifices  at  one  spot  only,  and  upon  this  single  Temple 
were  concentrated  all  the  glory  and  pride  which  among  any  other 
people  were  distributed  over  a  hundred  different  fanes.  Yet  in 
spite  of  this  adoration  of  the  Temple — to  thousands  a  distant 
Temple  which  they  rarely  saw — the  Judaism  of  the  day  was  not 
a  priestly  religion,  though  priestly  ideas  of  cleanness  and  unclean- 
ness  filled  an  important  part  of  it.  The  Synagogue  and  the 
Eabbi  overshadowed  the  Temple  and  the  priest. 

The  Rabbis  and  their  followers  constitute  the  Pharisees.  It 
is  probably  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  five-sixths  of  the  nation 
were  Pharisaic  more  or  less,  though  where  and  how  the  limits  ran 
it  is  hard  to  say.  The  Rabbis  of  30  A.D.  were  not  quite  identical 
with  the  Rabbis  of  300  a.d.  For  among  them  too  there  must 
have  been  many  types  and  kinds.  Some  combined  politics  with 
religion;  others  kept  themselves  aloof  from  the  governing  and 
political  world. 


§  32.     The  Law  and  the  infant  Church:  persecution 
and  intolerance. 

The  rule  of  the  Law  had  only  gradually  asserted  itself  after 
Ezra.  It  was  growing  during  the  Persian  period  (450-330  B.C.), 
and  during  the  Greek  period  after  Alexander.  But  the  stages  of 
its  growth  can  no  longer  be  traced.  It  was  subjected  to  a  counter 
current  and  a  cross  influence  by  the  introduction  and  development 
of  Hellenism.  Then  came  the  persecution  of  Antiochus  Epiphanes, 
the  Maccabean  revolt,  the  restored  national  independence  and  the 
heightened  national  consciousness.  The  Law  begins  to  rule  not 
merely  the  actions  of  private  life,  but  the  public  working  of  the 
State.  And,  as  is  so  often  the  case,  fanaticism  and  intolerance  go 
hand  in  hand  with,  or  follow  hard  upon,  heroism  and  martyrdom. 
The  same  temper  which  breeds  the  martyr  breeds  the  fanatic. 
The  Maccabean  heroes  kill  the  recusants  or  the  lax  to-day ;  they 
are  ready  to  be  killed  themselves  to-morrow.  And  when  seated 
in  the  saddle  of  power,  they  impose  the  Law  upon  others  by  sheer 


Ixxii  INTRODUCTION 

force.     Militant  Judaism  extends  its  borders,  and  whole  territories 
must  submit  to  compulsory  circumcision. 

This  is  not  the  place  in  which  to  speak  of  the  history  of  the 
infant  Church  from  the  death  of  Jesus  to  the  end  of  the  century. 
But  the  readers  of  the  Synoptics  must  be  prepared,  both  in  the 
words  ascribed  to  Jesus  and  outside  them,  to  find  a  reflection  of 
circumstances  and  moods  which  fall  within  those  seventy  years. 
And  prominent  among  those  circumstances  will  be  this,  that  the 
young  Christian  community  suffeied  persecution  from  the  Syna- 
gogue. Even  while  the  early  Christians  of  the  Jerusalem 
community  observed  the  ceremonial  enactments  of  the  Law, 
there  was  still  enough  difference  to  make  occasional  persecution 
highl}^  probable.  A  family  quarrel  is  often  the  bitterest  of 
quarrels.  That  the  new  community  believed  that  the  Messiah 
had  already  appeared  was  in  itself  a  serious  point  of  difference. 
A  lax  attitude  toward  the  Law  was  soon  to  follow.  The  Christians 
had  their  own  organization,  their  own  meetings,  their  own 
expectations.  Worst  of  all  the  Christians  soon  began  to  assert 
that  the  Founder  of  their  faith  was  a  divine  being,  a  very 
incarnation  of  God.  He  became  the  object  of  worship.  This 
to  the  Jews  seemed  rank  idolatry.  The  dominant  Pharisaic 
religion  could  not  brook  or  tolerate  so  marked  and  serious  a 
dissidence.  Renan  is  possibly  right  in  saying  that  but  for  the 
Roman  overlordship,  and  the  diflSculties  put  in  the  way  of  Jews 
exercising  the  right  of  life  and  death,  the  persecution  would  have 
been  more  grave  and  more  extensive.  The  historian  has  to  record 
what  he  finds.  He  may  interpret  the  facts,  but  he  cannot  conceal 
or  alter  them.  It  can  hardly  be  denied  that  the  secular  perse- 
cution of  the  Jews  by  Christian  authorities  may  be  regarded  as 
the  abiding  and  multiplied  revenge  of  the  short  and  occasional 
persecution  of  the  Christians  by  the  Jews.  'Persecute  your 
enemies  even  unto  the  hundredth  generation'  has  been  the 
principle  according  to  which  the  Church  has  exercised  an  awful 
punishment  upon  the  primary  offending  of  the  Synagogue. 

Judaism,  like  Christianity,  could  in  those  days  be  hardly  other 
than  intolerant.  Like  Christianity  it  was  better  and  more  attractive 
in  low  places  than  in  high  ones.  For  the  Jews,  like  the  Christians, 
believed  in  the  exclusive  rightness  of  their  own  faith  as  well  as  in 
the  soleness  and  exclusive  sovereignty  of  their  own  God.  To  believe 
correctly  was  a  virtue;  to  believe  otherwise  a  moral  defect,  a 
social  injury.  Toleration  combined  with  such  a  faith  was  at 
that  time  impossible. 

Successful  fanaticism  grows  by  what  it  feeds  on.  Yet  it 
may  also  be  said  that  it  grows  by  persecution.  Still  though 
stimulated  by  persecution  as  well  as  by  success,  fanaticism,  when 


INTRODUCTION  kxiii 

persecuted,  is  generally  unable  to  issue  in  act.  And  its  effect  upon 
character  is  partly  checked  and  hindered  by  other  influences  and 
agencies.  The  men  who  breathe  wild  imprecations  upon  their 
persecutors  are  often  within  their  own  community  models  of 
gentleness,  piety,  and  love.  But  successful  and  active  fanaticism 
tends,  as  it  would  seem,  to  harden  and  dry  up  man's  soul.  Hence 
we  notice,  from  the  Maccabean  revolt  to  the  destruction  of  the 
State,  a  certain  fierce  and  arid  tetnper  of  mind  and  type  of 
religion  which  are  unpleasing  to  our  modern  ideas. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  said  that  the  political  domination 
of  a  national  religious  Law  never  got  a  really  fair  chance.  The 
Maccabean  rulers  never  properly  and  completely  freed  themselves 
from  trouble  and  turmoil  with  the  Hellenistic  Syrian  power. 
Under  Simon's  son,  John  HjTkanus  (135-104  B.C.),  the  height  of 
Maccabean  power  is  reached;  yet  towards  the  close  of  his  reign 
Josephus  records  that  the  seeds  of  future  trouble  were  sown  by 
John's  quarrelling  with  the  Pharisees,  or  national  party,  and 
'joining  the  Sadducees.'  His  son  Alexander  Janneus,  who  suc- 
ceeded him  after  a  year  of  bloodshed  and  confusion,  passed  much 
of  his  reiga  in  wars,  both  external  and  civil.  The  Pharisees  are 
his  declared  and  life-long  enemies.  He  slays,  according  to 
Josephus,  no  fewer  than  fifty  thousand  of  his  own  people.  Upon 
his  death-bed  he  recommends  his  wife  Alexandra  to  be  reconciled 
with  and  to  obey  the  Pharisees;  his  advice  is  followed  for  nine 
years  (76-67).  The  violent  feud  between  her  two  sons,  which 
breaks  out  after  her  death,  leads  to  the"lntroduction  of  Pompey 
and  the  overlordship  of  Rome  (63). 

There  followed  twenty-three  troubled  years  till  the  accession  of 
Herod  the  Great.  It  was  thus  partly  due  to  the  native  rulers,  and 
partly  to  the  Roman  governors  and  administrators,  that  the  land 
was  never  happy  and  at  ease.  Intrigue  and  oppression,  corruption 
and  cruelty,  often  or  usually  prevailed.  In  addition  to  this  there 
was  in  the  Roman  period  a  frequent  violation  of  Jewish  suscep- 
tibilities. Herod  wanted  to  play  the  Hellenistic  and  cultivated 
king.  His  baths,  gymnasia  and  temples  grossly  offended  the 
intense  religious  feeling  of  the  people.  The  Roman  governors 
were  avaricious  and  imprudent.  The  last  and  the  worst  of  them, 
Gessius  Floras,  aimed  directly  at  stirring  up  insurrection  and  war. 
Thus  the  people  were  constantly  kept  in  unrest,  excitement  and 
wretchedness.  There  was  every  opportunity  given  for  hatred  and 
religious  bitterness.  The  'zealots'  and  ultra-nationalists,  who 
finally  got  supreme  control,  were  the  natural  product  of  the  events 
and  policy  pursued  by  the.  rulers.  Fanaticism  was,  as  it  were, 
artificially  fed  and  stimulated.  The  religion  of  the  day  was 
exclusive,  anti-heathen,  and  rigorous  :  the  Law  breathes  a  spirit  of 


Ixxiv  INTRODUCTION 

hostility  and  antagonism  and  ruthless  severity  to  all  idolatry, 
idolaters,  and  image  worship.  But  the  fierce  passions  of  men 
could  have  been  tolerably  easily  kept  in  check  and  abeyance 
by  scrupulous  respect  for  national  and  religious  susceptibilities: 
instead  of  which  they  were  constantly  ruffled  and  violated. 


§  33.     The  Messianic  hope.    Did  all  classes  observe  the  Law? 

Under  these  circumstances  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  Mes- 
sianic hope  should  have  revived.  We  do  not  hear  much  about  it 
in  Josephus,  but  there  were  special  reasons  why  he  desired  to  keep 
it  dark.  The  blacker  the  actual  condition  of  things  was,  the  more 
men  hoped  for  the  coming  of  the  Golden  Age,  when  Israel  should 
be  prosperous,  powerful  and  free,  and  when  righteousness  and 
peace  should  reign  supreme.  With  the  invariable  optimism  of  the 
Jews — without  which  they  could  hardly  have  survived  their  age- 
continued  miseries — the  final  crisis,  the  breaking  of  the  dawn, 
were  not  merely  longed  for,  but  expected  in  the  near  future.  The 
end  would  come  soon.  The  old  order  would  soon  close  for  ever: 
the  new  order  was  about  to  begin.  The  Kingdom  of  God  was 
surely  at  hand.  These  hopes  and  beliefs  were  combined  with  the 
now  almost  universally  accepted  doctrine  of  the  Resun'ection  of  the 
dead.  They  were  often,  but  not  necessarily,  associated  with  the 
figure  and  expectation  of  the  Deliverer-King,  the  Messiah-Prince, 
of  whom  some  of  the  prophets,  and  notably  Isaiah,  had  spoken. 
It  is  these  hopes  and  expectations  which  form  the  background,  and 
explain  the  appearance,  of  John  the  Baptist  and  his  preaching. 

It  is,  however,  to  be  remembered  that  we  are  dealing  with 
a  society  which  is  not  homogeneous.  It  may  be  called,  with 
perhaps  as  much  right  as  any  other,  transitional.  I  have  spoken 
of  the  domination  of  the  Law,  and  of  a  certain  fanatical  temper. 
But  the  domination  of  the  Law  was  not  quite  complete.  The 
legalism  of  300  A.D.  embraced  the  entire  body  of  Jews  more  equably 
and  with  fewer  exceptions  than  the  legalism  of  30.  It  was  more 
all-pervading,  yet,  what  to  many  will  seem  odd,  there  is  some 
evidence  and  reason  to  think  that  this  more  all-penetrating 
legalism  of  300  was  sweeter,  more  spiritual,  and  more  inward  than 
was  the  legalism  of  30.  It  was  more  religious,  less  national.  It 
had  become  more  assimilated  with,  more  part  and  parcel  of,  the 
entire  life  of  every  individual  Jew.  The  legalism  of  30  seems  to 
have  left  a  certain  section  of  the  people  outside  its  infiuence.  It 
had  not  absorbed  everybody.  Some  there  were  who,  for  one 
reason  or  another  (and  the  reasons  are  obscure),  did  not  live 
according    to   the   Law.      They  have   either  fallen  out   of   the 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxv 

ranks  of  the  legal  army  or  they  have  never  entered  them.  There 
were  nobles  and  rich  landowners  who  were  above  the  Law,  there 
were  unfortunates  who  were  below  it.  There  were  occupations, 
such  as  that  of  tax-collectors,  soldiers,  and  others,  upon  which  the 
Rabbis  and  Pharisees,  for  one  reason  or  other,  looked  with  sus- 
picion. Either  the  occupation  prevented  those  who  followed  it 
from  obeying  the  ritual  enactments  of  the  Law  or  it  made  them 
likely  to  disobey  its  ethical  commands.  Those  once  outside  the 
legal  ranks  the  Rabbis  and  Pharisees  seem  to  have  made  little  or 
no  effort  to  reclaim  or  convert.  They  were  left  severely  to  them- 
selves.    Yet  these  classes  could  not  have  been  very  large. 

It  must,  however,  be  frankly  stated  that  the  foregoing  remarks 
are  really  based  upon  inferences  from  the  Gospel  narratives  them- 
selves and  upon  little  more.  They  therefore  rest  upon  dubious 
evidence.  For  what  the  Evangelists  say,  and  what  Jesus  is 
made  to  say,  about  the  Pharisees,  the  Rabbis  and  the  Jews 
generally  is  naturally  to  be  taken  with  the  greatest  caution  and 
suspicion.  What  Catholics  say  about  Protestants,  or  Protestants 
about  Catholics,  or  Jews  about  Christians  (I  quite  admit  that  this 
hits  me),  or  Christians  about  Jews,  must  always  be  very  critically 
regarded.  But  the  evidence  of  the  Gospels  comes  very  much 
under  this  category.  It  was  inevitable  that  the  Pharisees  and  the 
Rabbis  should  be  presented  as  worse  than  they  really  were.  And 
similarly  it  was  inevitable,  if  there  existed  a  small  section  of 
persons  who  were  outside  the  ranks  of  the  'respectable'  classes 
that  observed  the  Law,  that  this  section  should  be  represented  as 
larger  and  more  important  than  it  really  was. 

/T      The  unfortunate  thing  is  that  in  the  Rabbinical  literature  we 
/get  no  clear  and  undisputed   evidence  which   substantiates  the 
I  Gospels.     To  begin  with,  that  literature  is  almost  all  of  it  very 
I  much  later  than  the  first  century  after  Christ. 
'        And  not  only  was  it  written  later,  but   the   Rabbis  whose  [ 
utterances  and  stories  it  reports  and  chronicles,  the  circumstances  ' 
it  reflects  and  tells  of,  were  almost  all  later  than  Jesus,  later  1 
than  the  fall  of  the  State,  later  than  the  Hadrianic  revolt.     If! 
you  cannot  argue  on  the  good  side  from  the  Talmud,  you  cannot . 
argue  on  the  evil.     The  evils  and  the  excellences  of  the  Talmudic  ( 
periods  are  not  necessarily  the  same  as  those  of  the  period  of  \ 
Jesus. 

§  34.     The  ' am  lia-aretz '  and  the  neglected  ' multitudes' 

The  Rabbinic  literature  does  indeed  contain  various  statements 
and  sayings — more  especially  sayings  and  statements  about  certain 
people,  or  a  certain  class  of  people  called  'people  of  the  land,' 


Ixxvi  INTRODUCTION 

am  ha-aretz — which  have  been  much  used  in  supposed  sub- 
stantiation of  the  Gospel  narratives  about  '  sinners '  or  about  what 
Matthew  makes  Jesus  say  respecting  the  multitude  who  were 
harassed  and  prostrate  like  sheep  without  shepherds.  It  has  been 
freely  supposed  that  the  sinners  and  neglected  multitude  of  the 
Gospels  and  the  am  ha-aretz  of  the  Talmud  are  one  and  the 
same. 

But  this  identification  is  precarious.  The  Talmudic  passages 
about  the  am  ha-aretz  are  obscure,  and  their  meaning  is  disputed. 
They  were  written  down  long  after  the  age  of  Jesus,  and  many  of 
them  seem  to  refer  to  a  period  after  his  death.  The  features 
which  characterize  the  Talmudic  am  ha-aretz  do  not  appear  to 
be  the  same  as  those  which  characterize  the  Gospel  '  sinners '  or 
'multitudes.'  It  is  therefore  unsafe  to  use  the  passages  in  the 
Talmud  in  illustration  or  confirmation  of  the  passages  in  the 
Gospels.  The  researches  of  Dr  Buchler  have  even  made  it 
possible  that  the  Talmudic  am  ha-aretz  did  not  belong  to  the 
'  multitude '  at  all,  that  they  were  not  poor  and  unhappy  and 
degraded,  but  rich  and  comfortable  and  prosperous.  The  Rabbis, 
at  any  rate,  were  drawn  from  the  people,  and  were  emphatically 
of  the  people.  Many  of  them  were  extremely  poor;  working 
with  their  hands  in  the  day-time,  studying,  discussing  and 
teaching  in  the  evenings  and  on  Sabbaths  and  festivals.  An 
habitual  antagonism  between  them  and  the  '  multitude '  is  out  of 
the  question.  And  thus  though  it  would  be  unsafe  to  aver  that 
the  Gospel  narratives  are  totally  inaccurate,  it  would  be  equally 
unsafe  to  regard  them  as  more  than  exaggerated  representations 
of  the  facts.  Dr  Buchler  holds  that  there  is  no  Rabbinic  evidence 
that  any  portion  of  the  population,  whether  in  Judaea  or  in 
Galilee,  consisted  of  poor,  despised  persons  who  did  not  observe 
the  ritual  Law,  and  had  'fallen  out  of  the  legal  ranks.'  The 
people  who  did  not  observe  the  Law  were  the  rich  rather  than  the 
poor:  the  'tax-gatherers'  were  rich,  as  even  the  Gospels  allow, 
and  so  in  all  probability  were  the  '  sinners.'  The  am  ha-aretz  are 
especially  held  up  to  reprobation  in  Rabbinic  literature,  because 
they  did  not  carefully  tithe  their  land.  Therefore  they  were 
possessors  of  property,  with  whom  a  'submerged  tenth'  is  not 
usually  identified  !  We  thus  see  how  doubtful  and  obscure  all  the 
Gospel  allusions  to  poor,  neglected,  or  spiritually  unhappy  people 
really  are.     (See  further  Additional  Note  43.) 

If  there  really  did  exist  a  'submerged  tenth,'  who  neglected 
the  Law,  disliked  the  Rabbinic  teachers  and  were  disliked  by 
them  in  return,  we  may  feel  fairly  sure  that  it  was  a  small  tenth 
and  no  more.  The  mass  of  the  nation  at  any  rate,  both  women 
and  men,  held  with   keenness  and  affection  to  the  Rabbinical 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxvii 

religion,  and  the  leaders  of  the  Pharisees  were  the  leaders  of  the 

people.     Josephus  is  not  likely  to  be  wrong  when  he  emphasizes 

over  and  over  again  that  the  Pharisees  had  'the  multitude'  on 

their  side.     Those  who  hated  the  Scribes  and  Kabbis  must  have 

been  few.     Yet  we  may  perhaps  assume  that  between  them  and 

those  who  followed  whole-heartedly  the  Pharisaic  faith  and  the 

enactments  of  the  Law,  there  were  probably  some  who  admired, 

but  followed  at  a  distance,  or  who  followed  only  partially,  or  who 

followed  with  discontent,  reluctance,  weariness,  or  dissatisfaction. 

To  a  few  the  Law  did  perhaps  present  itself  rather  as  a  burden 

than  a  grace,  as  a  worry  and  a  bondage  rather  than  as  a  distinction 

and  a  joy.     The  Law  of  30  was  not  the  Law  of  300.     It  had  not 

yet  become  the  solace,  poetry,  and  pride  of  a  hunted  and  despised 

people.    It  produced,  we  may  believe,  more  failures,  less  happiness, 

less  spiritual  satisfaction  and  well-being.     The  degrees  between 

joyful  observance  and  full  content  on  the  one  hand,  and  complete 

neglect  or  '  outsidedness '  on  the  other,  were  probably  very  many. 

There  were  many  degrees  and  shades  of  observance  and  neglect. 

/  Such  outsiders,  who  were  perhaps  more  numerous  in  Galilee  than 

/  in  Judaea,  were  attracted  by  the  teaching  and  personality  of  Jesus, 

I  and  to  such  persons  (the  '  sick '  and  ill  at  ease)  did  he  deliberately 

j    and  with  compassion  turn  and  minister.     He  cheered  them  and 

I    brought  to  them  a  new  hope,  a  new  light.     He  led  them  to  God. 


§  35.  The  various  classes  of  people  with  whom  Jesus  came  in 
contact:  formalists  and  outcasts;  liberals  and  apocalyptists. 
The  Essenes. 

We  may,  then,  suppose  that  in  Galilee  Jesus  had  come  into  more 
or  less  close  personal  contact  with  various  classes  of  persons,  before 
his  ministry  began.  First  and  foremost  there  were  the  Pharisees 
and  the  Rabbis, — the  great  majority  of  the  total  population. 
These  we  may  describe  as  the  conforming  members  of  the  estab- 
lished Church  with  their  leaders  and  teachers.  The  measure  of 
their  conformity  or  their  enthusiasm  doubtless  varied  among  the 
adherents  of  that  'church,'  as  it  varies  among  the  adherents  of 
any  existing  '  church '  to-day.  But  yet  we  may  call  them  roughly 
and  rightly  the  party  of  the  Pharisees.  There  can  be  little  doubt 
that  the  parents  of  Jesus  belonged  to  this  'party,'  and  that  he  was 
'  brought  up  to  obey  the  enactments  both  of  the  Written  and  of 
the  Oral  Law,  so  far  as  that  second  or  Oral  Law  had  been  yet 
developed  or  was  generally  observed  among  ordinary  person.s. 
Jesus,  then,  knows  the  Pharisees;  he  also  knows  the  prosperous 
rich,  the  landowners  and  nobles,  neither  whose  moral  nor  whose 


Ixxviii  INTRODUCTION 

ceremonial  standard  of  living  comes  up  in  many  instances  to  a 
high  level.  And  again  he  knows  others  such  as  merchants, 
shepherds,  tax-collectors,  soldiers,  who  are  looked  upon  with  grave 
suspicion  by  the  Pharisees  because  their  occupations  and  way  of 
life  either  rendered  it  difificult  for  them  to  observe  the  ceremonial 
law,  or  subjected  them  to  moral  temptations  from  which  they 
■were  commonly  thought  not  to  escape  unscathed.  And  then 
again  he  perhaps  knew  a  few  others,  poor,  despised,  unfortunate, 
degraded — not  many  in  number,  but  in  quality  and  circumstance 
interesting  and  important — who  also  were  not  supposed  to  belong 
to  respectable  society,  and  from  whom  Pharisees  and  Rabbis  kept 
carefully  aloof.  For  all  such  outcasts,  whether  rich  or  poor,  Jesus 
felt  much  concern.  For  sinners  and  for  unfortunate  persons,  for 
the  spiritually  destitute,  for  the  physically  aflSicted,  for  the  un- 
happy of  all  kinds,  he  had  an  open  ear  and  a  loving  heart.  He 
observed  that  no  official  teacher  or  Babbi  sought  them  out:  yet 
they  were  children  of  Israel  all,  and  if  the  call  to  repentance  arose, 
surely  they  should  not  be  left  outside.  Beneath  their  wayward 
and  sinful  and  afflicted  lives  he  could  discern  hearts  which  were 
susceptible  to  stirring  appeal  or  personal  affection. 

But  in  addition  to  these,  there  were  other  classes  in  Israel  as 
well.  The  tendency  of  the  Pharisees  and  Rabbis  was  to  interpret 
the  Law  more  and  more  strictly,  and  to  increase  the  wall  of  legal 
severance  which  separated  the  Jew  from  the  Gentile.  It  would 
be  unfair  to  say  that  the  Rabbis  deliberately  extended  the  cere- 
monial at  the  expense  of  the  moral  Law,  but  it  is  true  to  say  that 
their  devotion  to  the  non-moral  side  of  the  Law  did  occasionally 
produce  evil  results  on  the  moral  and  spiritual  side  both  in 
themselves  and  in  their  followers.  It  is  a  true  paradox  that  the 
more  universal,  everyday  and  obvious  the  dominion  of  the  cere- 
monial Law  became,  the  less  also  in  some  important  respects  grew 
its  moral  and  spiritual  dangers.  When  everybody  strictly  observes 
the  Sabbath,  and  when  nobody  eats  milk  and  meat  together,  the 
fulfilment  of  such  ceremonial  enactments  gives  no  distinction. 
They  have  almost  become  customs  of  propriety,  the  neglect  of 
which  would  indeed  be  outrageous,  but  the  observance  of  which  is 
nothing  to  boast  of  Distinctions,  differences  and  'merits'  had 
once  more  to  become  concentrated  upon  the  moral  laws,  which,  by 
the  very  constitution  of  human  nature,  are  by  some  obeyed  well, 
by  others  feebly,  and  by  yet  others  transgressed.  But  in  the 
days  of  Jesus  the  domination  of  the  ceremonial  Law,  as  inter- 
preted by  the  Rabbis,  was  not  yet,  as  we  have  seen,  coterminous 
with  the  whole  population. 

It  may  also  be  observed  that  Judaism  was  not  wholly  wanting 
in  liberal  tendencies  in  those  days,  and  men  of  such  tendencies 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxix 

were  probably  not  only  to  be  found  outside  of  Palestine.  There 
were  those  who  held  and  believed  that  the  true  circumcision  was 
of  the  heart  rather  than  of  the  flesh,  and  who  were  willing  to 
argue  that,  for  the  proselyte  at  least,  such  spiritual  circamcision 
was  all  that  God  required  or  that  man  should  ask.  They  were 
anxious  to  throw  the  moral  laws  of  the  Pentateuch  into  strong 
relief,  so  that  the  dangerous  multiplication  of  ritual  and  cere- 
monial enactments  might  be  counteracted.  Ceremonial  laws  were 
symbols,  perhaps  allegories,  of  spiritual  and  ethical  realities. 
Whether  Jesus  was  influenced  by  any  such  persons  it  is  impossible 
to  say.     It  is  not  inconceivable. 

About  such  matters  the  student  should  read  (with  caution)  the 
many  works  of  the  Jewish  scholar  Moritz  Friedlander,  and  the 
recent  admirable  book  of  Dr  G.  Klein  (of  Stockholm),  Der  dlteste 
christliche  Katechismus  und  die  jiidische  Propaganda-literatur. 

Others  there  were  who  studied  deeply  the  prophets  rather  than 
the  Law.  They  fed  their  hopes  upon  the  Messianic  utterances  of 
the  book  of  Daniel,  and  following  in  the  wake  of  the  writer  of 
that  book,  they  dreamed  visions  and  wrote  them  down.  The 
apocalyptic  writers  are  by  no  means  to  be  identified  with  the 
liberals,  but  yet  they  stand  off  the  line  of  the  regular  and  orthodox 
Babbis.  They  and  their  disciples  were  the  most  ardent  believers 
in  the  near  coming  of  the  crisis,  the  denouement,  the  Judgment. 
But,  on  the  whole,  they  were  less  spiritual  than  the  Babbis, 
who,  by  the  way,  regarded  it  as  a  sin  to  calculate  the  advent  of 
the  Messiah.  The  Judgment  to  the  apocalyptists  was  inclined  to 
become  all  too  exclusively  a  judgment  upon  Israel's  foes.  That 
Jesus  was  influenced  by  them  seems  likely.  At  all  events  we 
know  that  he  began  his  short  ministry  because  he  believed  that 
the  End  was  at  hand,  and  that  he  must  proclaim  its  coming.  But 
he  markedly  differed  from  the  apocalyptic  seers  in  keeping  more 
closely  than  they  to  the  teaching  of  the  oldest  and  the  greatest 
of  the  prophets.  Sin  would  be  struck  down  within  Israel  as  well 
as  without  it.  John  the  Baptist  struck  a  similar  note:  indeed 
from  him  it  was  that  Jesus  heard  it  and  passed  it  on. 

The  religious  ferment  and  variety  of  the  age  of  Jesus  are  also 
illustrated  by  the  brotherhood  of  the  Essenes.  It  is  still  a  disputed 
point  among  scholars  whether  their  customs,  doctrines,  and  rites 
as  described  by  Josephus  and  others  were  due  to  any  extent  to 
foreign  influences,  and  if  so  what  these  foreign  influences  were.  In 
some  respects  they  exaggerated  certain  rules  and  habits  which  pre- 
vailed among  the  stricter  Pharisees.  Thus  they  laid  great  stress 
upon  bodily  purifications  and  purity,  and  upon  the  observance  of 
the  Sabbath.  But  in  other  matters  they  broke  new  ground.  They 
formed  a  communistic  brotherhood,  and  for  the  most  part  remained 


Ixxx  INTRODUCTION 

through  life  unmarried.  Those  who  read  Josephus'  account  of 
them  in  the  eighth  chapter  of  the  Second  Book  of  the  War  will 
be  reminded  of  some  things  in  the  Gospels  and  in  the  teaching  of 
Jesus.  Such  points  are  the  stress  laid  upon  continence,  the 
objection  to  money,  the  habits  in  travel,  the  dislike  to  oaths, 
perhaps,  too,  the  communistic  brotherhood.  But  in  other  respects 
there  is  the  strongest  unlikeness.  Jesus,  as  we  shall  see,  kid  no 
stress  upon  outward  purity,  he  was  probably  not  over  particular 
about  dietary  laws,  he  was  not  intensely  strict  in  Sabbath  ob- 
servance ;  above  all  he  did  not  '  keep  himself  to  himself ;  he 
moved  freely  among  'unclean'  and  outcast  persons;  he  sought 
these  out  and  did  not  avoid  them.  In  the  Pharisaic  and  Essenic 
sense  he  did  not  'hate  the  wicked  and  help  the  righteous.'  Thus 
Jesus  was  certainly  not  an  Essene,  though  he  may  have  been 
attracted  and  influenced  by  certain  points  of  their  doctrine. 
Whether  John  the  Baptist  had  closer  relations  with  them  is 
not  so  clear,  but  it  is  not  very  likely. 


§  36.     The  contradictions  of  Judaism :  the  one  God 
and  the  national  cult. 

The  existence  of  these  various  types  and  classes  shows  that  the 
Judaism  of  the  first  century  was  not  only  full  of  variety,  but  that 
it  might  also  be  said  to  be  full  of  contradictions.  To  a  certain 
extent  these  contradictions  have  not  been  overcome  in  Judaism 
even  to-day.  These  contradictions  were  and  are  largely  due  to 
the  fact  that  a  pure  monotheistic  doctrine  was  wedded  to  a 
national  ritual.  Tribal  customs  formed  the  outer  expression  of 
what  was,  in  its  fundamental  tenet,  a  universal  creed.  The  result 
was  confusion.  It  was  the  more  noticeable  before  the  Temple  fell 
because  of  the  incongruous  mixture  of  nationality  and  religion. 
The  laws  of  the  nation  were  also  its  religious  doctrines  and  its 
ceremonial  rites.  Politics  and  religion  were  closely  blended.  The 
greatest  religious  hope  was  also  the  greatest  political  hope,  the 
greatest  national  hope.  This  tended  to  obscure  the  purity  of 
religion.  It  is  one  of  the  remarkable  points  about  Jesus  that  he 
is  apparently  interested  only  in  the  individual  and  in  religion. 
He  does  not  concern  himself  with  politics  or  with  the  national 
life.  An  apparent  effect  of  this  peculiarity  upon  his  conception 
of  the  Messiah  and  his  office  will  be  often  alluded  to  in  the  notes. 
Paul  consciously  freed  himself  and  his  religion  from  national 
contradictions  and  confusion  by  means  of  a  theory.  Jesus  freed 
himself  of  them  unconsciously  by  his  pure  religious  genius.  They 
dropped  away  from  him,  neglected  and  unnoticed. 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxxi 

One  contradiction  to  which  I  have  referred  would  not  have 
arisen  in  an  ordinary  heathen  religion,  or  even  in  one  where  only 
one  god  was  worshipped,  but  that  god  merely  and  solely  the  god 
of  the  nation.  For  a  national  cult  and  national  religious  laws 
would  harmoniously  fit  a  national  god.  But  though  the  God 
whom  the  Jews  worshipped  was  in  a  special  sense  their  God,  their 
national  God,  he  was  also  much  more.  He  was  the  only  God ;  the 
one  and  unique  God;  the  God  of  the  whole  world.  But  such  a 
universal  God  required  a  universal  cult.  A  national  worship  does 
not  fit  him.  Hence  the  contradictions  and  confusions  to  which 
I  have  alluded.  They  are  illustrated  in  the  attitude  of  the  Jews 
towards  proselytism.  I  have  already  referred  to  the  existence  of 
a  liberal  school  of  thought  among  the  Jews,  and  to  the  view, 
expressed  by  one  Rabbi  (and  probably  shared  by  many),  that 
circumcision  of  the  flesh  was  unnecessary  for  the  new-comer. 
There  is  evidence  that  outside  Palestine,  and  to  some  extent  also 
within  it,  there  was  a  considerable  amount  of  propagandist  fervour, 
crowned  with  a  considerable  amount  of  success.  This  is  not  the 
place  in  which  to  speak  at  length  about  a  most  intensely  interesting 
chapter  of  Jewish  history.  But  that  Judaism  for  various  reasons 
exercised  a  great  fascination  upon  the  heathen  in  the  first  century 
before  and  after  Christ  is  undoubted.  It  is  also  certain  that  there 
was,  in  one  way  and  another,  a  good  deal  of  effort  expended  in 
order  to  obtain  proselytes.  (I  am  not  merely  alluding  to  the 
compulsory  proselytization  and  circumcision  of  adjacent  tribes 
between  the  times  of  Judas  Maccabaeus  and  Herod  the  Great.) 
Yet  there  was  always  a  certain  difficulty  about  proselytes,  and 
a  school  of  thought  existed  which  was  opposed  to  them,  for  the 
convert  had  not  only  to  adopt  a  new  religion,  but  a  new 
nationality. 

The  Jews  were  proud  of  their  monotheistic  religion.     In  a 
sense  they  were  keen  to  push  it  and  to  proclaim  its  merits,  but 
they  were  hampered  by  their  nationalist  Law.     They  wanted  to 
stand   high   in   the    opinion    of  outsiders,   but   their   Law  to   a 
considerable  degree  made  them  hostile  to  foreigners,  and  unable 
and  unwilling  to  associate  with  them.     To  this  Josephus  bears 
abundant  witness.    The  proselytism  which  many  of  them  attempted  \ 
was  often,  as  it  would  seem,  undertaken  less  for  the  benefit  of  the  ! 
heathen  than  for  the  glory  of  their  nation  or  the  glorification  of  j 
their  creed  and  Law.     Jewish  proselytes,  we  may  well  believe,  ' 
were  readily  influenced  by  the  preaching  of  Paul.     For  here,  amid  ; 
some  blurring  of  monotheistic  purity,  and  in  spite  of  grave  infrac- 
tions, through  alien  dogmas,  of  the  ethical  and  religious  teaching 
of  the  prophets  and  of  Jesus,  is  at  last  reached  a  religion  where 
doctrine   and  cult  are  homogeneous  and  equally  universalist,  a 

M.  / 


Ixxxii  INTRODUCTION 

/  religion  a   central  feature   of  which   is  that,  before  a  common 
;  allegiance,  there  is  no  difference  between  Jew  and  Gentile,  and 
no  profit  in  circumcision  or  uncircumcision. 


§  37.    TFere  the  Jews  and  the  Rabbis  of  30  a.d.  religiously 
inferior  to  those  of  300  and  600  A.D.  ? 

A  theory  has  been  started,  to  which  allusion  will  be  made  in 
the  notes,  that  the  religious  condition  of  the  Jews  in  the  age  of 
Christ  was  much  inferior  to  what  it  became  after  the  awful 
purgation  of  the  war  and  the  destruction  of  the  State.  This 
theory  has  been  partially  accepted  in  the  foregoing  remarks,  but 
only  in  a  very  modified  form.  The  legalism  of  3CX)  and  600  was 
probably  superior  to  the  legalism  of  30.  There  were  unpleasing 
elements  in  the  very  varied  religious  phenomena  of  30,  from 
which  the  more  restricted  and  homogeneous  religious  phenomena 
of  300  and  600  were  free.  The  aristocratic  priesthood  and  the 
political  Pharisees,  with  their  externalism  and  selfish  interests, 
disappear.  The  outcasts  and  submerged  tenth  at  the  opposite 
end  of  the  scale  disappear  also.  All  become  nearer,  and  conform 
more  closely,  to  a  single  type,  and  find  in  conformity  to  that  tjrpe 
their  satisfaction  and  highest  good.  The  others  disappear  or 
become  Christians.  Less  extremes  and  less  variety  existed  in 
600  than  in  30.  There  was  less  breadth  and  less  liberalism  on 
the  one  hand,  but  also  less  ignorance,  aridjty,  and  political 
externalism. 

It  is  a  different  question  whether  the  average  and  ordinary 
Rabbi  of  30  was  inferior  in  moral  and  religious  worth  to  the 
average  and  ordinary  Rabbi  of  600,  or  whether  the  religion  which 
he  taught  in  30  was  inferior  to  the  religion  taught  by  his  successor 
in  600.  The  theory  of  improvement  was  invented,  not  as  a  result 
of  an  examination  of  the  evidence,  but  in  order  to  save  the 
accuracy  of  Jesus's  sweeping  indictments  against  the  teachers  of 
his  time  in  certain  portions  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels.  It  is  more 
probable  that  this  difference  between  the  average  and  ordinary 
Rabbi  of  30  and  600  is  largely  imaginary,  and  that  the  denuncia- 
tions put  into  Jesus's  mouth  are  too  sweeping  and  generalized.  Of 
this  there  will  be  something  to  say  in  the  notes.  Probably  Jesus 
did  not  condemn  so  profusely  as  his  reporters — with  whom  the 
great  conflict  between  Jew  and  Christian  had  begun — make  out. 
Probably  they  darken  the  shadows  to  increase  the  light.  Probably 
Jesus  himself,  like  Jeremiah  and  the  prophets  and  every  other 
religious  reformer,  exaggerated.  He  too  tended  to  think  that 
those  who  differed  from  him  must  be  bad,  and  he  failed  to  realize 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxxiii 

that  minute  ritual  observance  may  both  lead  up  to  God  and 
away  from  Him.  In  this  failure  he  is  followed  by  even  the 
most  impartial  theological  historians  at  the  present  day,  who 
think  that  'legal'  and  'spiritual'  are  necessarily  antithetic  or 
opposed  to  each  other.  Both  in  30  and  in  600  there  were 
doubtless  good  Rabbis  and  bad  Rabbis,  and  both  in  30  and  600 
a  distinctively  legal  religion  had  the  defects  of  its  qualities. 
Formalism  and  extemalism,  self-righteousness  and  hypocrisy, 
were  its  faults  in  600  as  well  as  in  30,  but  we  may  well  believe 
that,  especially  in  middle-class  society,  these  faults  were  in  30  no 
less  than  in  600  the  exception  and  not  the  rule. 


§  38.     The  condition  of  Galilee  in  the  age  of  Jesus. 

In  any  appreciation  of  the  character  and  teaching  of  Jesus  it 
would  have  to  be  borne  in  mind  that  he  was  a  native  of  Galilee. 
And  it  remains  to  be  asked  whether  the  somewhat  general  and 
vague  conclusions  which  have  been  reached  as  to  the  religious 
condition  of  the  Jews  in  the  first  century  after  Christ  need  special 
modification  or  emphasis  in  any  particular  direction  for  the  case 
of  Galilee.  Its  population  at  that  period  was  predominantly, 
though  not  exclusively,  Jewish.  It  was  fertile,  and  thickly 
populated.  It  has  been  supposed  that  the  number  of  'outcasts 
and  sinners,'  or,  in  other  words,  of  persons  who  did  not  scrupulously 
observe  the  ceremonial  Law,  and  were  despised  and  condemned 
by  orthodox  Rabbis  and  Pharisees,  was  proportionately  greater  in 
Gahlee  than  in  Judaea.  This,  however,  is  by  no  means  certain. 
Nor  does  much  good  evidence  exist  for  what  Professor  Cheyne 
has  called  their  imperfect  legal  orthodoxy.  In  fact,  another 
scholar  observes  that  '  upon  the  whole  they  are  said  to  have  been 
strict  in  their  religious  observances.'  It  has  also  been  supposed 
that  the  number  of  Rabbis  who  taught  and  argued  in  Galilee  was 
far  smaller  in  proportion  to  its  population  than  in  Judaea.  From 
the  Gospels  it  has  been  inferred  that  '  the  Messianic  hope  burned 
more  brightly  in  Galilee  than  anywhere  else  in  Palestine ' ;  but 
this  inference  has  not  much  to  back  it  up  outside  the  Gospel 
narratives.  That  the  land  was  far  from  the  capital  must  count 
for  something.  It  will  have  contained  many  pious  families  who 
lived  quiet  and  simple  lives,  and  did  not  meddle  with  politics. 
In  such  a  family  it  may  be  that  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  born. 


f2 


Ixxxiv  INTRODUCTION 

§  39.     The  'prophetic'  character  and  mission  of  Jesvs:  the  'lost 
sheep ' :   the  Kingdom  of  God :   Jesus  and  the  Law. 

In  the  admirable  Introduction  to  his  commentary  upon  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  M.  Loisy  has  two  luminous  chapters  upon 
the  career  and  the  teaching  of  Jesus.  I  dare  not  follow  him 
even  upon  the  smallest  scale;  but  I  would  like  to  indicate  very 
briefly  some  of  the  points  or  problems  as  regards  the  teaching,  at 
any  rate,  to  which  the  reader's  attention  must  be  called. 

Jesus  is  often  described  (especially  in  Luke)  as  a  prophet. 
And  it  is  from  the  prophetic  point  of  view  that  his  teaching,  with 
the  conflicts  which  it  brought  about,  must  primarily  be  regarded. 
This  does  not  mean  that  Jesus  was  specially  a  foreteller  of  future 
events.  It  means  that  Jesus  seems  in  many  respects  to  take  up 
the  rSle,  and  to  continue  the  teaching,  of  the  eighth  and  seventh 
century  prophets,  of  Amos,  Isaiah,  Jeremiah  and  Ezekiel. 

Like  the  prophets  he  announces  a  doom — a  doom  upon  the 
unrepentant,  upon  sinners.  It  is  true  that  the  Judgment,  the 
ddnouement,  the  crisis,  which  is  imminent,  will  affect  the  Gentile 
as  well  as  the  Jew.  But  Jesus — so  far  at  least  as  we  may  gather 
from  the  fragments  of  his  teaching  which  have  been  preserved 
to  us — was  mainly  concerned  to  emphasize  the  doctrine  that 
Israel,  just  because  of  its  '  sonship,'  would  not  be  exempt  from 
punishment.  There  are  many  sinners  in  Israel ;  sinners  in  high 
places  as  well  as  in  low.  And  many  who  proudly  think  themselves 
secure  will,  unless  their  hearts  are  changed,  be  swept  away  in  the 
coming  storm.  We  may  conceive  that  Jesus  would  have  heartily 
concurred  in  the  famous  words  of  Amos :  '  You  only  have  I  known 
of  all  the  families  of  the  earth ;  therefore  will  I  visit  upon  you  all 
your  iniquities.'  It  is  not  improbable,  therefore,  that  Jesus  may 
liave  predicted  the  fall  of  the  Temple,  even  as  we  find  it  stated  in 
Mark  (xiii.  i,  2). 

But  Jesus  was  not  merely  the  prophet  of  collective  or  general 
doom.  He  is  much  more  the  teacher  of  the  individual  than  was 
Amos  or  Isaiah.  By  his  time  religion  was  individualized :  the 
process  which  had  begun  with  Ezekiel  was  completed — or  shall 
we  say  completed  by  him  ?  Jesus,  like  Ezekiel,  is  the  watchman : 
he  is  to  warn  the  wicked  and  to  turn  him  from  his  evil  way. 

He  is  sent,  as  he  himself  says,  to  the  lost  sheep,  to  the  sinners. 
But  to  them,  as  we  have  seen  and  shall  abundantly  see,  his  message 
is  not  merely  one  of  denouncement.  He  goes  among  them  and 
eats  with  them.  He  will  touch  their  heart  in  a  number  of 
different  ways :  he  will  touch  it  by  arousing  admiration,  hope, 
and  love,  by  encouragement,  and  consolation,  by  powerful  sugges- 
tion that  the  bonds  of  sin  can  be,  and  have  been  broken,  and 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxxv 

that  a  new  life  can  be,  and  has  been  begun.  Like  the  God  of 
whom  Ezekiel  teaches,  Jesus  has  'no  pleasure  in  the  death  of 
the  wicked,'  he  is  desirous  'that  the  wicked  turn  from  his  evil 
way  and  live ' ;  and  so  he  goes  about,  intentionally  and  directly, 
'  to  seek  that  which  was  lost  and  to  bring  again  that  which  was 
driven  away '  (perhaps  driven  away  by  the  false  severity,  or  pride, 
or  carelessness  of  man).  He  will  '  bind  up  that  which  is  broken 
and  strengthen  that  which  is  sick.' 

This  we  may  regard  as  a  new,  important  and  historic  feature 
in  his  teaching.  And  it  is  just  here  that  opposition  comes  in  and 
begins.  To  call  sinners  to  repentance,  to  denounce  vice  generally, 
is  one  thing.  To  have  intercourse  with  sinners  and  seek  their 
conversion  by  countenancing  them  and  comforting  them — that  is 
quite  another  thing.  Did  not  all  respectable  persons  pray  and 
resolve  '  to  keep  far  from  bad  companions,'  to  avoid  the  dwelliug- 
place  of  the  wicked  ?  How  can  one  keep  the  Law  of  God  if  one 
associates  with  sinners  ? 

In  the  next  place  Jesus's  teaching  was  prophetic  because  he 
announced  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God.  The  Judgment  is 
to  culminate  in  the  Kingdom.  Indeed  the  real  importance,  so  to 
speak,  of  the  Judgment  is  that  it  must  herald  and  usher  in  the 
new  order.  The  Kingdom  of  God  is  the  central  feature  in  the 
teaching  of  Jesus,  and  to  his  conception  of  it  attention  must 
constantly  be  directed.  To  enable  as  many  to  enter  the  Kingdom 
as  the  conditions  would  allow,  and  to  enunciate  and  explain  what 
these  conditions  are,  occupied  much  of  his  time  and  care.  Many 
who  thought  that  they  would  infallibly  enter  it  would,  he  held,  be 
excluded.  Many  whom  others  thought  would  be  excluded  he, 
Jesus,  would  cause  to  enter.  So  far  as  it  was  supposed  that,  if 
the  Kingdom  were  soon  to  come,  all  Jews  would  enter  it  from  the 
mere  fact  of  their  birth,  Jesus,  we  may  be  sure,  like  the  true 
prophet  that  he  was,  combated  a  confidence  so  erroneous  and 
irreligious ;  whether,  however,  he  went  further,  and,  building  upon 
and  developing  certain  well-known  prophetical  utterances,  declared 
that  the  inmates  of  the  Kingdom  would  be  rather  Gentiles  than 
Jews,  is  a  point  upon  which  opinion  is  still  divided.  Two  things, 
at  any  rate,  seem  clear.  First,  that  Jesus  himself  never  dreamed 
of  any  preaching  outside  Israel  (either  directly  or  by  his  disciples). 
Secondly,  that  no  universalist  element  in  his  teaching  constituted 
any  part  of  the  conflict  between  himself  and  the  Jewish  authorities, 
whether  Sadducean  or  Pharisaic. 

The  Kingdom  is  the  starting-point  and  the  goal  of  Jesus's 
teaching.  But  much  lies  in  between.  A  large  proportion  indeed 
of  his  entire  religious  and  moral  teaching  lies  in  between :  most 
of  that  for  which  his  teaching  is  cared  for  and  admired  to-day. 


Ixxxvi  INTRODUCTION 

And  here  we  once  more  see  in  him  the  prophet.  What  are 
the  conditions  of  entry  into  the  divine  Kingdom  ?  Like  Ezekiel, 
Jesus  represents  the  entry  both  as  a  grace  and  as  a  guerdon. 
'God  will  give  you  a  new  heart:  make  you  a  new  heart,'  says 
Ezekiel.  And  Jesus  says:  'God  will  choose  those  who  are  to 
enter,  and  he  will  bring  them  in ;  strive  to  enter  the  Kingdom, 
and  this  is  how  you  should  set  about  it.'  The  demands  of  the 
prophets  are  the  demands  of  Jesus.  Justice  and  charity  towards 
man,  humility  and  love  towards  God ;  the  prophets  had  inculcated 
these,  and  Jesus  inculcated  them  again. 

But  the  great  point  of  resemblance  was  this.  The  prophets 
had  said  outward  worship,  sacrifices,  ceremonial  religion,  are  of 
little  good  and  little  avail.  Inwardness,  moral  goodness — these  are 
the  essentials.  Jesus  took  up  this  teaching.  And  as  sacrifices 
played  a  far  less  important  part  than  heretofore  in  Jewish  life — 
at  any  rate  outside  Jerusalem — as  quite  other  outward  forms  and 
ceremonies  were  now  predominant,  it  is  these  which  he  depreciates, 
and  in  the  heat  of  argument  is  even  led  on  to  attack.  It  is  the 
laws  about  the  Sabbath,  or  about  food,  the  rules  about  clean  and 
unclean,  which  he  criticizes  and  arraigns. 

Jesus  resumes  the  rdle  of  the  prophets,  but  since  Amos  and  even 
since  Jeremiah  spoke,  how  immeasurably  great  was  the  difference ! 
For  Amos  and  Jeremiah  spoke  when  there  was  no  universally 
accepted  code,  no  Mosaic  Law,  regarded  on  all  hands  as  perfect, 
authoritative,  and  divine. 

Thus  Jesus,  with  his  clear  prophetic  insight,  his  pure  religious 
spirit,  is  brought  up  sharp  against  a  tremendous  obstacle.  The 
Law  does  not  indeed  say  that  it  is  more  important  to  observe  the 
Sabbath  than  to  'love  mercy':  it  does  not  indeed  say  that  not  to 
eat  rabbits  is  of  greater  consequence  than  to  'walk  humbly  with 
God.'  But  it  does  say  that  all  its  ritual  and  ceremonial  commands 
are  the  direct  ordainment  of  the  perfect  God,  and  that  they  were 
to  be  perpetually  observed  throughout  all  the  generations  of  Israel. 
Was  then  the  Law  not  divine  ?  Or  had  Jesus  power  to  abrogate 
it  ?  Here  comes  in  the  tragedy ;  here  is  the  great  dividing  line 
between  the  new  Master  and  the  old  teachers.  Here  is  where  the 
conflict  begins.  What  was  the  attitude  of  Jesus  towards  the 
Law?  How  is  it  that  the  Law  is  to  be  both  disobeyed  and  obeyed? 
To  be  honoured  in  its  breach  as  well  as  in  its  observance  ?  We 
can  now  see  that  to  the  mind  of  Jesus  there  was,  as  it  were,  set 
an  impossible  task.  It  was  impossible  for  him  to  be  wholly  con- 
sistent ;  impossible  for  him  to  formulate  any  consistent  theory. 
Upon  the  rock  of  the  Law  the  new  prophet  was  bound  to  stumble. 
To  this  point,  then,  to  the  relation  of  Jesus  to  the  Law,  to  his 
criticisms  of  various  legal  enactments,  to  his  conflicts  with  his 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxxvil 

opponents,  and  to  their  criticisms  of  him,  the  attention  of  the 
reader  -will  have  constantly  to  be  called.  Jesus  and  the  Law — 
this  is  one  of  the  great  problems  of  his  life ;  and  it  is  a  problem 
in  which  we  have  to  try  our  utmost  to  understand  his  opponents 
and  our  utmost  to  understand  him. 

An  essential  feature  of  the  prophet  is  the  sense  of  commission 
and  vocation.  He  is  called  by  God  to  deliver  a  message,  and 
thus  stands  towards  God  in  a  certain  special  relation.  What  he 
speaks  he  speaks  in  God's  name,  and  he  believes  that  it  is  the 
divine  spirit  which  impels  him  to  his  work  and  directs  his  words. 
Jesus  does  not  preface  his  speeches  with  'Thus  saith  the  Lord, 
but  in  the  conviction  of  inspiration,  in  the  assurance  that  he  too 
was  called  and  chosen  by  God  to  do  a  certain  work,  he  entirely 
resembles  Amos,  Isaiah  and  Ezekiel. 


§  40.     Jesus  as  healer :   the  forgiveness  of  sins. 

Different  times  require  dififerent  kinds  of  prophetic  manifesta- 
tion. Jesus  not  only  speaks,  but  also  acts.  He  heals.  And  in 
his  healings  he  sees  of  necessity  the  most  evident  proof  of  his 
divine  mission.  The  healings  would  not  of  themselves  have 
produced  a  conflict,  but  if  the  healer  was  suspected  and  criticized 
on  other  grounds,  then  it  was  almost  necessary  to  urge  that  the 
healings  were  due  not  to  divine  agency,  but  to  the  power  of  evil. 
Neither  friend  nor  foe  had  any  other  explanation  than  these  to 
ofiier.  If  Jesus,  because  he  attacked  the  Law,  was  no  messenger 
of  God,  then  his  very  healings  proved  him  to  be  the  messenger 
of  the  Devil.  This  logic  was  irresistible,  and  the  conflict  was 
sharpened  at  this  point. 

Jesus  called  men  to  repentance :  and  with  the  call  there  went 
not  merely  denunciation,  but  comfort,  consolation,  encouragement. 
He  sought  to  open  the  eyes  of  the  blind,  to  lead  the  prisoners 
from  the  prison.  An  older  prophet  had  begun  his  message  with 
the  assertion  that  the  iniquity  of  Jerusalem  had  been  pardoned. 
Jesus  dealt  with  individuals  rather  than  with  the  community  as 
a  whole,  but  he  too  seems  to  have  felt  that  part  of  his  message 
was  to  announce  to  this  person  and  to  that  an  emancipation  from 
the  bondage  of  sin.  Strange  results  ensued  from  his  activities. 
Bodily  ailments,  in  which,  with  the  majority  of  his  contemporaries, 
he  often  saw  a  punishment  for  sin,  were  healed  by  him:  those 
who  had  hitherto  led  a  sinful  or  dubious  life  were  converted  by 
his  word.  Had  not  then  God  given  to  him  the  power  to  cancel 
the  punishment  of  sin  and  to  turn  the  sinner  from  his  iniquity  ? 
Was  he  not,  now  and  again,  impelled  as  God's  messenger,  to  say 


Ixxxviii  INTRODUCTION 

to  this  or  that  individual  on  whom  the  effects  of  sin  lay  heavy, 
and  in  whom  he  saw  the  possibilities  of  a  better  life,  '  thy  sins  are 
forgiven '  ?  Upon  this  feature  of  the  activity  of  Jesus  we  shall 
have  to  dwell  early  in  the  commentary  upon  Mark.  It  may 
have  been  emphasized  too  strongly  by  the  Evangelist,  but  it  was 
probably  historic,  and  it  may  also  have  constituted,  as  Mark's 
narrative  declares  that  it  did,  one  cause  of  the  conflict  between 
Jesus  and  the  Rabbis.  Did  he  ascribe  to  himself  a  power  which 
belonged  only  to  God  ?  Misconception  on  such  a  delicate  subject 
was  only  too  likely  to  arise. 

§  41.     Jesii^  and  the  claim  to  Messiahship. 

But  Jesus  did  not — so  the  gospel  story  would  have  us  believe-^ 
merely  regard  himself  as  the  chosen  prophet  of  God,  invested,  as 
the  other  prophets  before  him,  with  a  divine  message  and  with  God- 
given  powers.  At  some  period  of  his  career  the  conviction  seems  to 
have  come  to  him  that  he  was  yet  more  than  a  prophet,  that  he 
was  in  fact  none  other  than  he  of  whom  prophets  had  spoken  and 
for  whose  coming  so  many  generations  had  yearned,  the  Anointed 
One,  the  Messiah,  the  King.  In  what  sense  did  Jesus  believe  him- 
self (if  indeed  he  did  so  believe  at  all)  to  be  the  Messiah  ?  Here 
we  touch  upon  the  central  problem  of  the  gospel  story.  Was  his 
Messiahship  effective  during  his  life  or  only  latent  ?  Was  he  only 
the  Messiah  to  be,  and  when  would  he  be  invested  with  his  kingly 
oflBce  ?  And  what  sort  of  office  was  it  to  be  ?  A  king,  such  as 
Isaiah  of  Jerusalem  conceived  him,  ruling  in  righteousness  over 
a  liberated  people,  a  powerful  monarch,  just  and  good  and  kind, 
but  yet  a  real  monarch,  such  as  other  monarchs  are,  though  ruling 
for  his  people's  good  and  not  for  his  own  ?  Or  was  his  kingship 
merely  spiritual?  Was  he  to  rule  only  over  men's  hearts  and 
minds  as  the  revealer  of  a  new  and  higher  conception  of  life, 
of  goodness  and  of  love  ?  Was  the  scene  of  his  kingship  to  be 
Palestine  ?  or  was  there  to  be  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth,  and 
was  the  Kingdom  of  God,  in  which  he,  the  Messiah,  should  rule, 
to  be  that  semi-material  realm  to  which  the  quickened  dead 
should  rise  again  ?  And  was  this  kingship  with  which  he  was 
to  be  invested  to  come  to  him  during  his  lifetime,  while  he  was 
still  clothed  with  ordinary  flesh  and  blood,  or  must  he  first  pass 
through  some  great  change,  undergo  perchance  suffering  and 
death,  and  only  through  these  attain  unto  his  glory  ?  All  these 
are  questions  to  which  various  answers  can  be,  and  have  been, 
given,  some  of  which,  with  the  arguments  on  this  side  and  on 
that,  will  be  submitted  to  the  reader's  judgment  in  the  course  of 
the  commentary. 


INTRODUCTION  Ixxxix 

If  Jesus  in  any  of  these  senses  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  or 
if  his  disciples  claimed  the  Messiahship  for  him,  this  claim  would 
have  been  the  greatest  and  the  sorest  source  of  conflict  with  all 
the  Jewish  authorities.  So  far  as  the  Sadducean  priesthood  is 
concerned,  for  the  obvious  reason  that  a  claimant  to  the  Messiah- 
ship  meant  the  displacement  of  their  regime,  popular  disturbance, 
and  war  with  Rome.  So  far  as  the  Pharisees  and  Rabbis  were 
concerned,  for  one  main  reason,  and  perhaps  for  another.  That  a 
prophet  and  teacher  who  had  dared  to  criticize  the  Law  and  had 
denounced  the  official  exposition  of  it,  should  then  claim  to  be 
Messiah,  was  an  insuflferable  pretension  and  arrogance.  And  just 
possibly,  the  Messiah  whom  Jesus  claimed  to  be,  or  to  become, 
was  not,  in  the  opinion  of  the  Rabbis  (whatever  else  he  was),  the 
Messiah  whom  older  prophecy  had  described  and  foretold.  Not 
so  would  the  Son  of  David  appear  to  claim  his  own. 


§  42.     The  relation  of  Jesus  to  Ood. 

Lastly,  did  Jesus  just  because,  or  partly  because,  he  felt  him- 
self to  be  Messiah,  feel  himself  to  be  more  than  'a  mere  man,' 
feel  himself  in  some  special  relation  to  the  Divine  Father  ?  For 
was  not  the  Messiah  the  Son  of  God  ?  Jewish  thought  had  not 
remained  wholly  content  with  the  purely  human  conception  of 
Messiah  contained  in  Isaiah  xi.  Some  thinkers  and  dreamers  had 
come  to  picture  the  Messiah  as  a  semi-divine  being,  pre-existent, 
already  and  for  long  ages  back  living  with  God  in  heaven  till  the 
fated  moment  of  his  descent  upon  earth  should  arrive.  If  Jesus 
came  to  the  conclusion  that  he  was  Messiah,  did  he  therefore  also 
believe  that  he  was  nearer  and  more  akin  to  God  than  all  other 
men — if  not  less  human,  yet  certainly  more  divine  ?  Or  was  the 
process  just  the  reverse  ?  Was  it  his  purely  religious  conception 
of  sonship  which  led  him  on  to  the  belief  in  his  Messianic  vocation  ? 
Did  he  hold  that  none  had  felt  God  to  be  their  Father  with  the 
same  intensity  that  he  felt  it  ?  Did  he  believe  that,  just  because 
he  was  God's  son  as  no  man  before  him  had  ever  been,  therefore 
he  was,  or  would  be,  God's  anointed  ?  These  questions  too  will 
be  alluded  to  in  the  notes.  Their  immense  importance  needs  no 
proving.  And  if  Jesus  put  forward  any  such  personal  claim,  if  he 
ascribed  to  himself  any  semi-divine  powers  or  nature,  the  opposition 
of  Jewish  teachers  would  be  increased  tenfold.  For  even  though 
some  thinkers  and  dreamers  might  hold  that  Messiah  was,  or 
would  be,  more  than  man,  such  a  theory  was  very  different  from 
a  regular  claim  made  by  a  particular  living  individual,  whose 
'  mere  humanity '  seemed  obvious  to  every  eye.    Such  a  claim  from 


xc  INTRODUCTION 

such  a  person  was  almost  blasphemy :  no  man  might  venture  to 
arrogate  unto  himself  the  qualities  and  the  nature  of  the  divine. 

Such,  then,  are  some  of  the  main  features  in  the  teaching  and 
the  position  of  Jesus  which  present  problems  for  discussion  and 
for  doubt.  Such,  too,  are  the  main  features  which  seern  to  have 
brought  about  his  conflicts  with  the  Rabbis  and  the  priests,  and 
ultimately  to  have  caused  his  death. 

And  all  these  features  became  exaggerated  after  the  crucifixion 
and  in  the  later  reports  of  his  life  and  teaching.  The  question 
which  constantly  presents  itself  to  us  is :  how  far  did  these  features 
actually  appear  in  his  lifetime  and  in  his  actual,  historic  ministry? 

§  43.     Changes  made  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus  after  his  death  ; 
(a)  Israel  and  the  Gentiles;  the  Pharisees  and  the  Law. 

For  with  his  death  the  whole  perspective  changed.  It  really 
speaks  exceedingly  well  for  the  accuracy  and  honesty  of  the  oldest 
sources  that  we  can  discern  as  much  history  in  the  Gospels  as  (in 
the  opinion  of  most  critics)  we  actually  can — that  we  can  discern 
through  theory,  exaggeration,  legend  and  even  myth,  the  true 
lineaments  of  the  historic  Jesus. 

If  Jesus  preached  the  Kingdom,  his  followers  preached  him. 
As  Loisy  says :  '  What  the  apostles  began  to  preach  was  not  the 
story  of  the  Christ,  still  less  a  system  of  doctrine,  a  scheme  of 
teaching  drawn  up  and  fixed  by  him,  nor  was  it  the  proclamation 
of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  as  Jesus  himself  had  formulated  it  up 
to  the  very  day  before  his  death.  The  unexpected  death  of  the 
preacher,  ignominious  and  terrifying  as  it  was,  had  deranged  the 
equilibrium  of  their  faith;  and  when  this  faith  found  once  more 
a  firm  basis  (assiette)  in  the  belief  of  the  Resurrection,  it  had 
already  advanced  a  large  step  beyond  the  limits  within  which  the 
teaching  of  Jesus  had  been  confined.  For  now,  in  order  to  diffuse 
itself,  that  faith  had  not  to  speak  directly  of  the  Kingdom,  but 
of  the  Christ,  whose  manifestation  had  to  be  shown  as  certain, 
although  retarded  (dont  il  fallait  que  la  manifestation  parvi 
acquise,  bien  qu'elle  f'At  retard4e).  Instead  of  first  of  all  believing 
in  the  Kingdom  which  had  not  yet  come,  one  had  to  believe  in  the 
Messiah  who  had  come.  To  prove  to  the  Jews  that  Jesus,  though 
he  died  on  the  cross,  was  none  the  less  the  Messiah, — this  was  the 
task  which  was  now  imposed  upon  his  disciples.  For  its  fulfilment 
it  was  not  sufficient  for  them  to  use  their  memories ;  they  had  to 
find  new  arguments  for  the  support  of  their  faith'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  176). 

A  crucified  Messiah,  and  a  Messiah  whose  history  should 
consist  of  two  parts — the  first  part  an  ordinary,  human  life  ending 


INTRODUCTION  xci 

in  a  shameful  death ;  the  second  a  later,  yet  unfulfilled  appear- 
ance in  heavenly  glory  (both  of  them  conceptions  unknown  to 
Judaism) — had  now  to  be  championed  and  maintained.  And 
with  this  huge  change  other  changes  came  as  well.  The  breach 
with  the  Synagogue  gradually  widened.  The  Law  was  more  and 
more  neglected  and  violated — at  least  by  many  of  the  new-comers 
and  under  the  influence  of  Paul.  The  new  religion  began  to  be 
preached,  and  to  find  its  warmest  and  best  adherents,  among  the 
Gentile  world.  These  very  changes  brought  about  an  inevitable 
exaggeration  of  the  original  points  and  features  of  conflict. 

First,  as  regards  doctrine,  apart  from  the  personality,  nature 
and  office  of  the  Master  himself 

Jesus  had  undoubtedly,  prophet-wise,  denounced  the  sinners 
in  Israel,  and  possibly  he  had  even  foretold,  like  Jeremiah,  the 
destruction  of  the  Temple.  These  historic  sayings  become, 
after  his  death,  unconsciously  exaggerated.  The  privileges  of 
Israel  are  to  be  taken  away ;  the  holy  city  is  to  be  destroyed  (as 
the  disciples  of  the  disciples  themselves  witnessed);  no  longer 
unbelieving  Israel,  but  the  new  Israel,  the  community  of  Christian 
believers,  is  to  inherit  the  ancient  promises  and  to  enter  into  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven.  For  those  Israelites  who  refuse  to  accept 
Jesus  as  the  Messiah  the  doom  is  Hell,  with  its  everlasting  punish- 
ment, with  its  wailing  and  gnashing  of  teeth  unto  the  end  of 
time. 

Jesus  in  his  lifetime  had  conflicts  and  differences  of  opinion 
with  the  Pharisaic  champions  of  the  Law,  with  the  Rabbis  of 
Galilee  and  of  Judaea.  Though  his  death  was  primarily  caused 
by  the  priests  and  the  Romans,  yet  doubtless  some  of  the  Rabbis 
in  Jerusalem  were  also  privy  to  his  arrest  and  assented  to  his 
condemnation.  This  conflict  becomes  exaggerated.  From  the 
beginning  the  Pharisees  and  Scribes  are  his  enemies;  they 
denounce  him ;  he  denounces  them.  They  are  all  bad ;  they  are 
full  of  sins  and  corruption ;  they  long  to  compass  his  destruction 
and  his  death. 

In  respect  to  the  teaching  of  Jesus  about  the  Law,  as  in 
respect  to  his  teaching  about  the  Gentiles,  the  tendency  to 
emphasize  and  exaggerate  was  cheeked  by  a  cross-current.  For 
one  section  of  the  earliest  Christians  still  cared  for  and  observed 
the  Law.  Jesus  had  not  attacked  and  violated  the  Law  to  such 
an  extent  as  to  make  this  legal  position  untenable  for  any  of  his 
adherents.  He  had  adopted  a  prophetic  attitude  towards  the 
Law.  The  Inward  rather  than  the  Outward ;  love  rather  than 
sacrifice ;  this  was  his  position.  Whether  he  had  formulated  any 
more  theoretic  point  of  view  may  well  be  doubted.  Thus  we  find 
in  the  Gospels  exaggerations  of  both  kinds.     '  Not  one  jot  or  tittle 


xcu  INTRODUCTION 

of  the  Law  shall  ever  pass  away  till  all  is  fulfilled.'  On  the  other 
hand  we  find  the  conception  that  at  least  one  Mosaic  ordinance 
was  given  to  the  Israelites  because  of  the  hardness  of  their  hearts. 
We  find  a  theory  announced  that  Jesus  came  to  'complete'  the 
Law,  not  to  '  destroy '  it,  but  this  completion  in  regard  to  such 
an  important  element  of  the  Law  as  the  dietary  injunctions 
comes  upon  occasion  to  something  not  remotely  resembling  abro- 
gation. Here  in  each  case  the  question  as  to  historical  accuracy 
needs  careful  weighing.  Have  the  reporters  exaggerated  the 
hostility  of  Jesus  to  the  Law,  have  they  exaggerated  his  esteem 
for  it  ?  Have  they,  rather  than  he,  formulated  his  theoretic  atti- 
tude towards  it  ? 

And  so  as  to  the  Gentiles.  Did  Jesus  contemplate,  agam 
prophet-wise,  the  inclusion  of  the  Gentile  world  in  the  community 
which  he  sought  to  found  ?  Did  he  bid  his  disciples  preach  the 
gospel  to  all  nations,  or  did  he  bid  them  carefully  avoid  those 
who  were  not  of  Israelite  blood  ?  What  was  his  own  attitude 
towards  the  heathen?  Did  he  share  'Jewish  particularism,'  or 
had  he  consciously  and  deliberately  overcome  it  ?  The  double 
tendency  in  the  Gospels  makes  the  answer  the  more  difiBcult  and 
uncertain. 


§  44.     (b)    The  Messiahship  and  the  relation  to  God. 

But  exaggeration  was  naturally  most  rampant  in  all  that  had 
to  do  with  the  person  and  office  of  the  Master. 

Jesus  had  undoubtedly  performed  some  striking  wonders  of 
'  healing.'  These  are  made  more  wonderful  still.  Fresh  miracles 
are  invented ;  ordinary  events  are  turned  into  miracles.  The 
ministry  of  Jesus  becomes  one  long  exhibition  of  divine  power, 
fighting  the  powers  of  darkness.  Jesus  is  always  in  the  right; 
his  opponents  are  always  in  the  wrong.  He  reads  men's  thought-s 
and  hearts.  He,  not  so  much  as  God's  prophet,  but  in  virtue 
of  his  own  personality  and  authority,  announces  and  gi-ants 
the  forgiveness  of  sin.  He  is  the  Messiah,  and  God  proclaimed 
his  Messiahship  to  him  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  ministry. 
If,  for  certain  reasons  of  his  own,  he  concealed  that  Messiahship 
for  a  while,  the  powers  of  darkness  at  any  rate  always  knew  him 
for  what  he  was.  He  foreknew  and  foretold  the  sequence  of  his 
life  and  death :  all  was  prearranged,  foreordained.  He  predicted 
his  arrest,  his  Passion,  his  resurrection  'on  the  third  day.'  His 
life  becomes  a  divine  drama;  even  his  teaching  becomes  a  mystery, 
which  was  intended  to  darken  the  minds  of  all  except  the  Elect. 
Jesus  foresaw  the  persecutions  of  his  disciples  from  the  hands  of 


INTRODUCTION  xciii 

the  Jews.  He  told  them  how  they  were  to  behave  under  these 
persecutions :  he  gave  rules  for  the  new  community  and  its 
government.  The  cross  upon  which  he  died  becomes  an  emblem 
of  his  teaching.  Those  who  would  be  his  disciples  must  be 
prepared  to  die  even  as  he  died,  nay  even  to  bear  their  cross 
daily  in  a  life  of  hardship,  self-denial  and  renunciation.  If  Jesus 
the  Messiah  suffered  at  his  death,  the  suffering  tends  to  be 
regarded  as  even  anticipated  in  his  life :  he  is,  ab  least,  a  homeless 
wanderer  who  has  nowhere  to  lay  his  head  in  safety  and  repose. 

Jesus  the  Messiah  'rises'  after  his  death  to  immortal  life. 
This  too  he  predicted  and  foreknew.  Did  the  historic  Jesus  fore- 
see his  death  ?  Did  he  go  to  Jerusalem  to  conquer  or  to  die  ? 
Had  he  at  any  rate  a  vague  presentiment — anticipations  of  disaster 
to  himself,  though  not  to  the  Kingdom  ?  Did  he  think  that  the 
service  he  had  to  render  to  the  coming  and  imminent  Kingdom 
might  even  demand  his  own  death  ?  In  that  case  he  might  also 
have  held  that  if  he  had  to  die  before  the  Kingdom  came,  he  would 
rise  again  soon  in  order  to  share  in  it  or  to  become  its  chief  All 
these  are  questions  which  the  Gospel  narratives  insistently  demand 
of  us.  The  '  line  of  exaggeration '  it  is  not  diflScult  to  see.  Jesus 
knows  exactly  all  that  is  to  happen.  First  his  death,  then  his 
resurrection,  then  (after  an  interval)  his  reappearance  on  the 
clouds  in  glory  as  openly  manifested  Messiah.  To  the  Death 
succeeds  Resurrection ;  to  the  Resurrection  succeeds  a  triumphant 
Parousia.  Then  will  the  drama  of  Israel  and  the  world  conclude : 
the  Messiah  will  be  also  the  judge — the  heavenly  judge  who  shall 
assign  to  all  then  alive  and  to  the  risen  dead  their  portions  of 
gladness  or  of  misery  for  ever  and  ever.  Amid  all  this  develop- 
ment and  'exaggeration'  how  are  we  to  discover  the  sense  in 
which  the  historic  Jesus  accepted  the  Messiahship  for  himself, 
what  he  meant  by  it,  and  what  he  anticipated  would  be  the 
manner  of  its  manifestation? 

The  Messiah  was  God's  son.  Had  not  the  Psalmist  made  God 
say  of  him :  '  Thou  art  my  son  :  this  day  have  I  begotten  thee '  ? 
Both  in  this  Messianic  sense,  and  in  a  spiritual  sense,  Jesus  may 
well  have  felt  and  held  himself  to  be  the  Son  of  God.  Here  too 
the  Gospel  '  exaggerates '  upon  a  historic  basis.  It  pushes  the 
date  of  his  sonship  backwards:  it  hardens  the  meaning  of  it, 
separating  Jesus  ever  more  and  more  from  other  men,  increasing 
his  measure  of  divinity,  magnifying  his  conception  of  it,  till 
finally  we  get  the  stories  of  the  infancy,  the  annunciation  and 
the  miraculous  birth.  Jesus  becomes  the  Son  of  God  not  merely 
as  the  Messiah,  but  as  metaphysically  related  to  the  Godhead. 
He  becomes  not  merely  a  divine  being,  but  a  part  of  God  himself, 
with  powers  hardly  inferior  to  those  of  his  Father.      And  with 


xciv  INTRODUCTION 

these  exalted  powers  there  comes  an  increased  and  deadly 
particularism.  If  Jesus,  like  all  passionate  reformers,  could  not 
imagine  that  there  could  be  any  right  which  was  not  on  his  own 
side,  his  disciples  soon  came  to  believe  that  none  could  know  God 
and  love  him  well  unless  they  believed  in  Jesus  and  his  divinity. 
It  was  a  very  early  '  exaggeration '  of  his  prophetic  impetuosity 
which  made  them  make  Jesus  say :  'All  things  have  been  delivered 
unto  me  by  my  Father ;  and  no  one  knoweth  the  Son,  save  the 
Father;  neither  doth  any  know  the  Father,  save  the  Son,  and 
he  to  whomsoever  the  Son  willeth  to  reveal  him.'  Or  is  this 
famous  passage  authentic  ?  Did  Jesus  carry  his  claims  so  far  ? 
Did  his  conception  of  God,  and  of  his  own  sonship,  and  of  their 
relations  to  each  other,  amount  even  unto  this  ?  Here  we  have 
the  problem  of  authenticity  at  its  acutest  and  most  important 
point. 

However  this  special  question  may  be  determined,  it  is  at  any 
rate  at  these  very  points  where  conflicts  soon  arose  between  the 
Christian  and  the  Jew,  and  where  the  centre  of  gravity  of  the 
new  religion  lies,  that  the  records  of  the  Gospels  are  to  be  most 
critically  examined.  And  this  whether  they  deal  with  incident 
or  with  teaching.  But  a  large  part  of  the  teaching,  including 
the  famous  paradoxes  of  the  Sei-mon  on  the  Mount,  lies  outside. 
And  just  as  it  is  quite  certain  that,  however  much  (if  such  be 
our  judgment)  this  teaching  transcended  or  even  contradicted 
the  teaching  of  contemporary  Rabbi  and  Scribe,  Jesus  could 
nevertheless  have  gone  on  inculcating  it  for  ever  without  coming 
to  an  evil  end,  so  also  is  it  here  that  we  may  look  for  the  greatest 
accuracy  in  the  record  and  the  greatest  measure  of  authenticity. 
Wellhausen's  caution  as  regards  the  tradition  of  the  teaching  and 
the  sayings  may  well  be  borne  in  mind,  but  it  has,  I  venture  to 
think,  to  be  checked  by  this  other  principle  or  test  which  has 
just  been  laid  down. 


§  45.     The  various  problems  raised  by  the  life  of  Jesus. 

A  commentary  upon  the  Gospels  is  in  any  case  not  also  a 
'Life  of  Christ.'  Whether  the  material  for  such  a  Life  exists 
may  well  be  doubted.  And  the  Introduction  to  such  a  tentative 
commentary  as  this  is  still  less  the  place  in  which  to  attempt  it. 
Only  incidentally,  and  as  occasion  arises,  will  the  commentary 
discuss  questions  relating  to  the  character  of  Jesus,  the  nature 
and  development  of  his  teaching,  the  manner  of  his  life  and 
death.  It  will  also  occasionally  consider  how  far  the  Gospel 
narratives  can  be  regarded  as  historic,  and  how  far  the  Jesus  of 


INTRODUCTION  xcv 

actual  fact  must  be  conjecturally  supposed  to  have  differed  here 
and  there  from  Jesus  as  Mark,  Matthew,  and  Luke  portray  him. 

Perhaps,  however,  before  bringing  these  few  introductory  pages 
to  a  close  it  may  be  desirable  to  call  attention  once  more  in  yet 
another  way  to  those  problems  to  which,  in  the  notes,  the  reader's 
attention  will  more  frequently  be  directed. 

The  exact  years  of  the  birth  and  death  of  Jesus  may  still 
be  in  dispute,  but  that  he  was  born  about  4  B.C.  and  died  about 
30  A.D.  seems  fairly  certain.  And  what  appears  equally  sure  is 
that  the  length  of  his  ministry  did  not  extend  over  more  than  a 
year  and  a  quarter,  or  a  year  and  a  half.  Hence  it  follows  that 
all  the  problems  about  Jesus  to  which  any  answer  is  possible  are 
concentrated  about  the  last  two  years  of  his  life.  How  he  lived, 
what  he  did  and  how  he  developed,  from  infancy  till  he  was  about 
thirty-two,  we  cannot  say. 

The  short  last  section  of  his  life  of  which  the  Synoptic  Gospels 
tell  may  be  roughly  divided  into  two  portions  of  unequal  length. 
The  first  of  these  is  the  Galilsean  period ;  the  second  the  journey  to 
Jerusalem,  and  its  results.  It  may  be  said  that  the  main  problem 
of  his  life  is  contained  in  the  question,  How  did  he  come  to  die  ? 
Or,  again,  the  question  may  be  put  thus :  To  what  end  did  he  go 
to  Jerusalem  ? 

Among  other  difficult  matters  which  this  question  involves  is 
the  fundamental  problem  as  to  what  Jesus  thought  of  himself 
This  problem  has  been  touched  upon  already.  Did  Jesus  suppose 
himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  and,  if  so,  in  what  sense  ?  Did  he  start 
the  Galilsean  ministry  with  this  idea,  or  did  the  idea  only  assume 
definite  shape  and  conviction  towards  its  close  ?  We  shall  see  that 
while  Jesus  from  first  to  last  seems  to  have  believed  in  the  imminent 
end  of  the  world,  or  of  the  Existing  Order,  he  did  not,  probably,  for 
a  while,  regard  himself  as  the  Messiah.  He  felt  himself  to  be 
divinely  sent,  a  prophet  like  the  prophets  of  old,  but  not  at  once, 
or  very  soon,  the  Messiah, 

Some  scholars,  we  shall  hear,  think  that  Jesus  never  claimed  to 
be  the  Messiah  at  all.  This  we  shall  consider  a  less  probable 
hypothesis.  But  if  he  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  what  sort  of 
Messiah  did  he  conceive  himself  to  be  ?  Was  it  completely  new 
wine  which  he  poured  into  that  old  bottle  ?  Here  we  shall  see  that 
controversy  rages,  and  that  no  final  and  satisfactory  result  has 
been,  or  probably  can  ever  be,  attained. 

Did  he  call  himself  the  Son  of  Man,  and,  if  so,  with  what 
intention,  and  with  what  relation  to  the  Messianic  title,  to  the 
ordinary  Messianic  conception,  or  to  his  own  Messianic  claim  ? 
Many  theories  can  be  drawn  up;  many  varying  answers  can  be 
given.      Some  fit  some  of  the  facts  and  statements ;  others  fit 


xcvi  INTRODUCTION 

others.  None,  perhaps,  fit  all.  Hence  the  difficulty  of  coming 
(with  such  meagre  and  in  parts  untrustworthy  material)  to  any 
confident  and  certain  result. 

Among  the  minor  questions  which  the  fundamental  question 
includes  are  these :  What  was  the  view  of  Jesus  concerning  the 
rule  and  overlordship  of  the  Romans  ?  And  upon  what  charge  or 
charges — whether  false  or  true — was  he  condemned  to  die  by  the 
Jewish  authorities  and  by  the  Roman  governor  ?  Who  is  respon- 
sible for  his  death  ?  Even  here,  too,  the  answers  that  may  be 
given,  with  fair  arguments  and  show  of  reason,  are  different,  and 
even  here,  while  we  shall  see  that  one  answer  is  more  probable 
than  another,  definite  certainty  cannot  be  arrived  at. 

The  main  elements  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  were  laid  down 
and  spoken  in  Galilee.  If  the  question  be  asked.  What  was  the 
character  or  nature  of  this  teaching?  the  answer  is  partly  dependent 
upon  the  answer  to  that  other  question,  What  did  Jesus  think  and 
teach  about  himself?  But  we  shall  see  that  it  is  only  partly  so 
dependent.  It  is,  moreover,  only  partly  dependent  upon,  or 
connected  with,  Jesus's  belief  in  the  imminent  End  of  the  Age. 
We  shall  observe  that  Jesus  was  not  always  thinking  of  that  great 
event.  It  formed,  doubtless,  the  background  for  all  his  teaching, 
but  much  of  that  teaching  was  spoken  as  if  no  such  terrific  change 
was  at  hand ;  or,  at  any  rate,  much  of  it  was  applicable  to,  and 
was  even  intended  for,  ordinary  conditions  of  existence,  such  as  they 
were  when  his  words  were  said,  and  in  some  respects,  at  least,  such 
as  they  are  even  to-day.  Whether  there  was  any  change  or 
development  in  the  religious  and  ethical  teaching  of  Jesus,  whether 
the  demands  he  made  upon  those  who  would  be  his  true  disciples 
were  increased,  whether  his  teaching  was  at  first  less '  apocalyptic ' 
and  became  more  so,  are  also  questions  which  will  be  noticed  as 
they  arise.  This  last  question  is  to  some  extent  connected  with 
the  meaning  to  be  assigned  to  that  term  frequently  upon  Jesus's 
lips — the  term  with  which  his  ministry  opens — but  of  which  the 
precise  signification  is  still  often  doubtful  and  disputed — namely, 
the  famous  'Kingdom  of  God,'  or,  as  Matthew  calls  it,  the  'Kingdom 
of  Heaven.' 


§  46.     The  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah  and  the 
conception  formed  by  Jesus. 

The  various  theories  about  Jesus  and  the  ultimate  objects  of 
his  brief  career  often  rest  upon  fragile  bases.  Many  of  them  seem 
to  do  violence  to  some  part  or  other  of  the  Gospel  evidence  or  to 
the  evidence  of  the  Rabbinical  literature.     Or  if  they  do  not  do 


INTRODUCTION  xcvii 

violence  to  what  the  Gospels  say,  they  seem,  if  I  may  put  it  thus 
oddly,  to  do  violence  to  what  they  do  not  say. 

Take,  for  instance,  the  question  as  to  whether  Jesus  thought 
himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  and  if  so,  what  sort  of  Messiah  he 
thought  himself,  or  wanted,  to  be.  The  hypothesis  that  he  never 
identified  himself  with  the  Messiah  at  all  cuts  the  gordian  knot 
too  crudely.  It  explains  some  facts,  but  it  leaves  others — and 
more  important  and  crucial  ones — unexplained.  It  is  not  merely 
that  various  stories  recorded  in  the  Synoptics  must  be  regarded  as 
unhistorical,  but  the  very  career  of  Jesus,  with  its  crisis  and 
its  end,  become  vague  and  difficult  to  understand. 

Yet  not  much  less  difficult  is  the  conception,  repeated  in  a 
hundred  different  forms  and  shades,  that  Jesus  did  indeed  claim 
to  be  the  Messiah,  but  such  a  Messiah  as  had  never  before 
been  thought  of,  alaove  all  things  not  a  Jewish  Messiah.  He 
allowed  his  disciples  to  regard  him  as  the  Messiah ;  he  had  no 
better  name  to  invent ;  but  it  was  a  mere  shell,  a  mere  name,  for 
something  totally  different  from  the  ordinary  Jewish  conception. 
In  the  course  of  the  commentary  this  hypothesis  will  crop  up  again 
and  again,  and  we  shall  see  how  arbitrary  and  difficult  it  is. 

What  is  usually  meant  by  the  '  ordinary  Jewish  conception  of 
the  Messiah '  ?  The  answer  must  be :  something  extremely 
disagreeable.  Indeed  the  'ordinary  Jewish  conception  of  the 
Messiah,'  created  by  Christian  theologians  as  a  foil  to  the  'pure 
spiritual '  conception  of  Jesus,  is  an  eviscerated  conception  in 
which  all  the  cheap  things  are  left  in  (and  exaggerated)  and  all 
the  valuable  things  are  left  out. 

The  '  ordinary  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah '  means,  so  far 
as  I  can  gather,  that  of  an  intensely  '  national '  and  '  legal '  king, 
under  whose  warlike  and  bloody  rule  the  Jews  avenge  themselves 
upon  their  enemies,  kill  the  majority,  enslave  the  rest,  and  live  in 
gorgeous,  outward,  material  prosperity  for  ever  and  ever.  Now 
this  is  a  caricature  for  many  reasons.  It  is  a  half  truth,  and 
we  know  what  half  truths  are. 

The  desire  for  prosperity,  for  freedom,  for  '  imperial '  rule  in 
the  place  of  cruel  subjection,  was  doubtless  strong  in  the  popular 
mind,  and  the  desire  for  revenge — after  Titus — was  not  even  absent 
from  all  the  Rabbis.  But  the  essential  feature  of  the  ordinary 
conception  of  the  Messiah  was  that  of  a  righteous  king  ruling  over 
a  righteous  people ;  the  Messianic  era  was  indeed  one  of  prosperity, 
but  far  more  was  it  one  of  peace  and  goodness  and  the  knowledge 
of  God.  So  far  as  it  was  this,  why  should  not  Jesus  have  wished 
to  be  the  Jewish  Messiah  ?  What  is  there  so  very  dreadful  and 
immoral  and  unspiritual  in  the  conception  of  Isaiah  xi. — of  a 
righteous  king  and  a  God-fearing  and  righteous  nation? 

M.  9 


xcviii  INTRODUCTION 

But,  then,  there  comes  another  difficulty.  We  talk  of  the 
•  ordinary  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah.'  But  what  was  '  the 
ordinary  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah  '  in  the  age  of  Jesus  ? 
And  was  there  one  prevailing  conception  at  all  ?  We  do  not  really 
and  certainly  know.  The  idea  of  the  warlike  king  seems  to  have 
been  on  the  wane.  God  would  accomplish  the  redemption  and 
establish  the  Kingdom  at  his  own  time  and  in  his  own  way.  The 
king  would  rather  teach  than  fight.  He  might  be  discovered 
perchance  healing  the  sick,  and  only  ascend  his  '  throne '  when  all 
'  enemies '  had  disappeared  or  been  converted. 

So  although  Jesus  did  not — and  this  is  certain — conceive  that 
the  assumption  of  his  throne  and  the  establishment  of  the  Kingdom 
would  involve  his  own  appearance  at  the  head  of  an  army,  never- 
theless he  would  not,  for  this  reason,  have  formed  a  conception 
which  was  un-Jewish  and  unfamiliar. 

If  he  had  formed  a  conception  of  his  Messianic  office  which  was 
wholly  unlike  that  of  most  of  his  contemporaries,  why  did  he  choose 
and  allow  the  name  ?  Why  did  he  not  reject  it  ?  Why  did  he  not 
more  clearly  explain :  '  Though  I  do  not  object  to  your  thiaking  me 
the  Messiah,  and  though  I  shall  die  as  King  of  the  Jews,  yet  you  saust 
understand  that  my  Messiahship,  even  after  my  resurrection,  will 
never  remotely  resemble  the  ordinary  Jewish  conception  of  the 
Messiah '  ?  Why  was  it  left  to  the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  to 
make  him  say  that  ? 

We  shall  be  inclined  to  believe  that  most  facts  (though  not 
necessarily  all  the  facts)  will  be  accounted  for  if  we  suppose  that 
Jesus  did  believe  that,  either  at  a  d^ouement  before  his  death  or 
at  the  Parousia  after  his  death,  he  would  '  rule '  over  a  righteous 
people.  We  have  no  means  of  deciding  what  he  thought  would 
be  the  fate  of  the  huge  Gentile  world.  Perhaps  he  thought  (with 
the  best  utterances  of  the  older  prophets)  that  they  would  all  be 
'  converted  '  and  become  voluntary  subjects  of  his  Kingdom — all  of 
them,  at  least,  w^ho  had  escaped  the  Judgment.  For  Jesus,  like  his 
contemporaries,  undoubtedly  believed  in  a  Judgment,  and  moreover 
he  seems  to  have  believed  that  the  number  who  would  be  'lost'  in 
the  Judgment  would  be  (to  our  ideas)  painfully  large.  Among  those 
victims  of  the  Judgment  there  would  doubtless  be,  in  his  opinion, 
a  number  of  Gentiles  as  well  as  a  very  large  quantity  of  Jewa 
Those  who  remained  over,  whether  Jewish  or  pagan  by  birth, 
would  now  become  pure  worshippers  of  the  One  God  and  loyal 
subjects  of  the  Messianic  King. 


INTRODUCTION  xcix 


§  47.     Jesus  and  the  ' masses' 

It  has  recently  been  supposed  by  Prof.  Bacon  that  Jesus 
regarded  himself  as  the  Messiah,  or  was  willing  to  let  others  so 
regard  him,  only  in  so  far  as  he  stood  forth  'as  the  leader,  champion, 
and  vindicator  of  the  disinherited  sons.'  The  Messiah  to  Jesus 
had  no '  theocratic  connotations ' ;  it  meant  merely '  He  who  brings 
Israel  into  its  predestined  relation  of  sonship  to  God.'  Over  and 
over  again  does  Prof.  Bacon  speak  of  the  '  masses '  and  of  Jesus 
as  their  champion.  The  '  masses '  are  apparently  put  on  one 
side :  a  few  Rabbis,  Pharisees,  and  priests  on  the  other.  He  speaks 
of  the  '  narrow  cliques  of  scribes  and  Pharisees,'  '  the  chaberim  of 
synagogue  orthodoxy  on  one  side,  the  am  ha-aretz,  the  masses  of 
the  people  on  the  other.'  These  masses  are  '  spiritually  dis- 
inherited.' This  is  probably  the  weakest  theory  of  all,  so  far  as 
the  facts  are  concerned.  Prof.  Bacon  allows  that  Jesus  '  did  follow 
a  role  that  led  to  his  execution  by  Pilate  as  a  political  agitator ' 
(p.  106).  Nevertheless  all  that  he  will  allow  as  to  the  Messiah- 
ship  is  this  championship  of  the  '  disinherited  masses ' ;  only  thus 
may  Jesus  have  'regarded  his  calling  as  in  some  remote  sense 
Messianic' 

But  there  is  little  evidence  of  disinherited  masses,  even  within 
the  Gospels.  Even  the  Gospels  scarcely  imply  that  the  masses 
had  no  religion  which  they  cared  for  or  brought  them  comfort,  or 
that  the  Rabbis  were  not  their  teachers  or  their  friends.  And 
outside  the  Gospels  the  evidence  is  the  other  way.  The  Pharisees, 
as  Josephus  tells  us,  formed  the  popular  party.  They  have  the 
people  on  their  side.  And  if  ever  there  was  a  teaching  class 
drawn  from  the  people,  it  was  the  Jewish  Rabbis  of  old — men 
who  took  no  pay  for  their  studies  and  services,  and  in  many 
cases  earned  their  living  by  their  hands.  As  I  have  already 
mentioned  the  am  ha-aretz  may  possibly  be  not  poor  folk,  but 
rich  folk.  In  any  case  they  are  not  the  people — a  more  dubious 
identification  was  never  made.  There  were  doubtless  many  bad 
Rabbis  in  those  days  as  later ;  the  Talmud  itself  castigates  such, 
but  the  greater  number  of  Rabbis,  even  as  they  sprang  from  the 
people,  loved  the  people,  taught  the  people,  and  had  the  people  at 
their  back.  The  masses  were  not  disinherited :  the  martyr  race 
par  excellence  found,  and  continued  for  long  ages  to  find,  its  best 
happiness  in  the  practice  of  its  religion.  There  was  no  need  for 
Jesus  to  teach  them  that  God  was  their  Father ;  they  knew  it  all 
along.  They  knew  it  then ;  they  continued  to  know  it ;  they 
know  it  now.  If  they  had  not  known  it,  they  would  not  have  died 
in  thousands  for  their  faith  :  if  they  did  not  know  it,  they  would 


INTKODUCTION 


not  be  suffering  now.  With  the  leading  priests  at  Jerusalem  the 
case  is  different,  but  even  there,  and  in  spite  of  the  oppression  and 
dishonesty  which  undoubtedly  were  practised  by  many,  we  must 
not  suppose  that  either  Rabbi  or  people  was  not  attached  to  the 
Temple  and  its  services.  We  must  not  measure  the  men  of  ancient 
time  by  modern  standards. 


§  48.     Jesus  as  prophet :   did  he  intend  to  found 
a  new  religion? 

It  does  not,  however,  follow  from  what  has  just  been  said  that 
the  teaching  of  Jesus  was  not  greater  or  more  original  than  that  of 
the  ordinary  teacher  of  his  day.  It  undoubtedly  was.  And  there 
is  a  further  point  still. 

That  the  teaching  of  Jesus  was  in  important  points  opposed  to 
the  teaching  of  the  contemporary  Rabbis  seems  certain.  I  have 
ventured  to  say  that  Jesus,  at  any  rate  in  his  earlier  ministry, 
seems  most  aptly  to  be  described  as  a  true  successor  to  the  old, 
and  especially  to  the  great  pre-exilic,  prophets,  Amos,  Hosea, 
Isaiah.  And  this  is  the  impression  which  he  made  upon  his  con- 
temporaries. They,  too,  found  his  teaching  new,  inspired,  prophetic. 
The  difficulties  which  such  teaching  brought  to  its  author,  and  the 
honest  opposition  which  it  encountered,  were  due  to  the  profoundly 
important  fact  that  when  Amos  and  Isaiah  spoke  there  was  no 
authoritative,  divine,  '  Mosaic '  Law  in  existence,  and  when  Jesus 
spoke  there  was.  Of  the  relation,  partly  conscious  and  partly,  as 
it  were,  unconscious,  in  which  Jesus  stood  to  the  Law  there  will 
be  much  to  say  in  the  notes.  Jesus,  as  I  have  said,  had  to  hark 
back  from  the  Law  to  the  prophets.  His  teaching  is  a  revival  of 
prophetic  Judaism,  and  in  some  respects  points  forward  to  the 
Liberal  Judaism  of  to-day. 

Another  gravely  important  question  which  may  be  asked  about 
his  teaching  is :  Did  he  intend  to  found  a  new  religion  ?  This 
question  is  distinct  from  the  other  one  as  to  whether  his  teaching 
is  sufficiently  novel,  distinctive,  and  comprehensive  as  to  justify  a 
separate  religion  with  a  separate  name  being  founded  upon  it, 
even  apart  from  any  doctrine  as  to  his  Messiahship  or  divinity. 
Such  might  be  the  position  of  much  modem  Unitarianism,  for  which 
doubtless  there  would  be  much  to  say.  Whether  Jesus  himself 
intended  to  found,  or  foresaw  the  founding,  of  a  new  religion  apart 
and  distinct  from  Judaism,  is,  however,  another  question.  It  is 
clearly  in  part  dependent  upon  the  views  which  Jesus  held  as  to 
the  end  of  the  world.  If  he  thought  that  that  end  was  near,  he 
can  hardly  have  also  intended  to  found  a  new  religion  and  a  new 


INTRODUCTION  ci 

religious  community.  Taken  all  in  all,  it  seems  probable  that 
Jesus  was  not  the  conscious  founder  of  the  Christian  Church.  He 
was  and  meant  to  remain  a  Jew.  Or  rather  the  question  of 
separating  from  the  Synagogue  never  presented  itself  to  his  mind. 
He  wanted  to  purify,  to  quicken,  to  amend,  but  not  to  break  away 
and  make  a  fresh  beginning.  He  continued  the  work  of  Amos, 
Hosea,  and  Isaiah.  His  Kingdom  of  God,  from  one  point  of  view, 
was  a  reformed  Judaism.  And  possibly  it  may  come  to  pass  that 
in  his  teaching  there  may  be  found  a  reconciliation  or  meeting- 
point  between  a  Reformed  or  Liberal  Judaism  and  a  frankly 
Unitarian  Christianity  of  -the  distant  future.  That  Judaism  and 
that  Christianity  may  find  that  they  differ  in  name,  in  accent,  and 
in  memories  rather  than  essentially  or  dogmatically.  That  Judaism 
and  that  Christianity  may  both  claim  Jeaus  as  their  own. 

§  49.     The  Gospels,  the  New  Testament  and  the  Jew. 

It  might  be  asked:  What  is,  or  what  should  be,  the  Jewish 
interest  in  the  New  Testament,  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  or  in  the 
life  and  character  of  Jesus  ?  To  these  questions,  too,  the  com- 
mentary will  supply  some  incidental  answers.  The  origin  of 
any  great  religion  which  has  filled  so  immense  a  place  in  the 
history  of  the  world  must  surely  be  of  interest  to  every  cultivated 
person.  To  know  something  about  a  Book  and  a  Person  that  have 
been  of  such  huge  importance  in  the  world,  and  that  are  of  such 
great  importance  still,  is  a  right  and  reasonable  thing — a  desirable 
part  of  knowledge.  But  the  European  Jew  lives  in  a  Christian 
environment,  a  Christian  civilization.  He  has  absorbed  much  of 
this  civilization  himself;  he  breathes  it  in;  it  is  part  of  him. 
He  reads  the  history  of  the  country  of  which  he  is  a  citizen. 
This  civilization  and  this  history  are  all  unintelligible  without 
Christianity.  They  rest  upon  the  New  Testament  and  the 
Gospels.  The  book  which  has  had  the  greatest  influence  upon 
European  history  and  European  civilization  is  the  Bible.  The 
Jew  does  not  mind  saying  and  repeating  this.  But  he  too  often 
forgets  that  the  Bible  which  has  had  this  influence  is  not  merely 
the  Old  Testament.  It  is  the  Old  Testament  and  the  New 
Testament  combined.  And  of  the  two,  it  is  the  New  Testament 
which  has  undoubtedly  had  the  greater  influence  and  has  been  of 
the  greater  importance.  It  is  the  Gospels  and  the  life  of  Christ 
which  have  most  markedly  determined  European  history  and  most 
influenced  for  good  or  evil  many  millions  of  lives.  If  it  is  an 
improper  ignorance  not  to  have  read  some  portions  of  Shakespeare 
or  Milton,  it  is,  I  am  inclined  to  think,  a  much  more  improper 
ignorance  not  to  have  read  the  Gospels. 


cu  INTRODUCTION 

The  curiosity  of  the  Jew  as  regards  these  writings  might  also 
be  legitimately  aroused  when  he  reflects  that  the  Gospel  hero  was 
a  Jew,  and  that  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  were  mainly 
written  by  Jews.  Jewish  ignorance  of  the  Gospels  is  indeed  not 
unnatural.  It  has  many  causes  which  I  will  not  here  enumerate. 
It  needs,  even  to-day  perhaps,  some  detachment  of  mind  to  say: 
'  I  will  read  and  study  the  book  upon  which  is  based  the  religion 
which  has  inflicted  upon  my  ancestors  such  incalculable  cruelty 
and  wrong.  I  will  read  and  study  the  book  from  which  comes  the 
religion  which  vaunts  itself  to  be  a  religion  of  love,  but  which,  so 
far  as  my  race  is  concerned,  has  usually  been  a  religion  of  hate.  I 
will  read  and  study  the  book  from  which  proceeds  a  monotheism 
less  pure  and  lofty  than  my  own,  a  monotheism,  if  it  can  be  called 
such,  which  has  deified  a  man  and  invented  the  Trinity ;  I  will 
read  and  study  the  book  from  which  was  evolved  the  religion 
which  pretends  to  have  superseded  and  to  be  superior  to  my  own 
— to  be  purer  and  better  than  my  religion,  of  which  the  cardinal 
doctrines  are  contained  in  such  words  as :  Hear,  0  Israel,  the 
Lord  thy  God  the  Lord  is  One.  Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy 
God  with  all  thy  heart.  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself. 
What  doth  the  Lord  require  of  thee,  but  to  do  justly,  and  to  love 
mercy,  and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God  ? ' 

Yet  this  detachment  of  mind  must  now  be  demanded. 
Judaism,  and  therefore  the  Jews  or  some  Jews,  must  answer  the 
questions,  and  answer  them  better  and  more  impartially  than  they 
have  yet  been  faced  and  answered:  What  is  the  right  Jewish 
attitude  towards  the  New  Testament?  what  are  we  to  think  about 
the  Gospels  and  the  Gospels'  hero?  I  cannot  believe  that  the 
best  and  final  answers  will  be  merely  negative.  They  will  not 
be  framed  upon  the  familiar  lines  that  what  is  new  in  the 
Gospels  is  not  true,  and  what  is  true  is  not  new.  Does  Judaism 
really  expect  that  in  the  future — even  the  distant  future — the  Old 
Testament  will  be  'accepted'  and  the  New  Testament  'rejected'? 
Does  Judaism  really  expect  that  the  Bible,  for  the  Europe  of  the 
'  Messianic '  age,  will  be  a  smaller  Bible  than  the  European  Bible 
to-day  ?  Will  it  include  the  Old  Testament  only  ?  But  if  such 
an  idea  is  inconceivable,  if  the  Bible  for  Europe  has  been 
constituted  once  and  for  all — whatever  men  may  think  of  its 
theologies— should  not  Judaism  take  up  some  more  reasoned  and 
studied  attitude  towards  so  permanent  a  part  of  the  religious 
literature  and  religious  consciousness  of  the  Western  world? 

One  view  which  will  be  incidentally  maintained  and  supported 
m  this  commentary  is  that  Judaism  has  something  to  gain  and 
absorb  from  the  New  Testament.  There  are  teachings  in  the  New 
Testament,  and  above  all  in  the  Gospels,  which  supplement  and 


INTRODUCTION  ciii 

carry  forward  some  essential  teachings  in  the  Old  Testament.  It 
seems  true  to  say  that  for  moral  and  religious  value  neither  the 
Old  Testament  can  dispense  witli  the  New  Testament  nor  the 
New  Testament  with  the  Old  Testament.  I  will  not  attempt  to 
sum  up  here  the  special  excellences  and  values  of  either.  So  far 
as  the  Gospels  are  concerned,  these  excellences  will  be  alluded  to 
in  the  commentary.  But  over  and  above  the  excellences  in  detail, 
there  is  the  spirit  or  impression  of  the  whole.  So  too  with  the 
Old  Testament,  the  Hebrew  Bible.  The  strong,  virile,  healthy 
tone  of  the  Old  Testament  religious  teaching  is  sometimes  con- 
trasted with  a  certain  sentimentality  and  introspectiveness  in  the 
New.  Its  vigorous  social  and  '  collective '  morality — its  insistence 
upon  justice  and  righteousness  in  society  and  the  State — are  also 
sometimes  contrasted  with  a  certain  marked  individualism  in  the 
New.  Contrasts  proverbially  exaggerate,  yet  there  may  be  some- 
thing not  wholly  false  in  this  contrast  as  in  others.  Meanwhile 
we  need  both  the  Old  Testament's  imperative  demand  for  a 
righteous  nation,  and  the  New  Testament's  insistent  emphasis 
upon  the  value  of  the  individual  soul ;  we  need  both  the  severity 
of  justice  and  the  tenderness  of  love.  As  regards  the  latter  pair 
of  apparent  opposites  they  are  both  present  in  both  Testaments, 
but  in  different  ways.  And  these  different  ways  could  themselves 
be  made  to  form  one  illustration  the  more  for  my  contention  that 
an  Englishman,  a  German,  or  a  Frenchman,  be  he  Christian  or  be 
he  Jew,  has  something  to  gain,  something  of  moral  or  religious 
value  to  absorb,  both  from  the  New  Testament  and  the  Old,  or,  if 
the  collocation  be  more  emphatic,  both  from  the  Gospel  and  the 
Law. 


§  50.     The  Gospels,  the  Rabbinical  literature  and  Judaism. 

And  if  it  be  said  that  the  Jew  is  not  confined  to  the  Old 
Testament,  but  that  he  has  also  the  Rabbinical  literature,  and 
that  therefore  he  need  not  study  the  New  Testament,  there  are 
several  rejoinders.  First,  there  are  things  of  value  in  the  New 
Testament  which  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  Rabbinical  litera- 
ture. Secondly,  whereas  in  the  Rabbinical  literature  the  great 
things  are  scattered  around  and  among  a  huge  mass  of  third 
and  fourth  rate  material,  in  the  New  Testament  they  are  found 
knit  together  in  a  small  compass,  emphasized,  concentrated,  and 
condensed.  Thirdly,  the  great  things  in  the  Rabbinical  literature 
are  often  the  casual  utterances  of  a  hundred  different  authors, 
whereas,  in  the  New  Testament,  they  to  a  great  extent  form  an 
essential  part  of  the  teaching  of  one  or  two  great  minds,  and  they 


CIV  INTRODUCTION 

are  strikingly  and  splendidly  expressed.  Fourthly,  the  Rabbinical 
literature  is  unwieldy,  huge,  and  suited  for  the  specialist  only; 
whereas  the  New  Testament  is  small  and  short,  instinct  with 
genius,  first-class  literature,  and,  as  regards  the  Gospels,  quite 
suited  for  modern  readers.  Being  first-class,  it  bears  translation. 
Being  the  work  of  genius,  it  is  a  book  not  for  one  age,  but 
practically,  like  Shakespeare  or  Homer,  for  all  time.  Fifthly,  the 
average  Jew  is  not  acquainted  with  the  Rabbinical  literature  even 
if  it  could  supply  the  place,  which  it  cannot,  of  the  New  Testament 
and  the  Gospels.  Except  the  Liturgy,  which,  as  it  includes  the 
Sayings  of  the  Fathers,  is,  I  admit,  a  very  important  exception, 
he  knows  the  Old  Testament  only.  Sixthly  (and  this  is  perhaps 
the  most  important  point  of  all),  the  religious  value  of  the 
teaching  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  for  the  modem  Jew  is  not  to  be 
measured  by  the  presence  or  absence  of  parallels  to  the  various 
sayings  of  Jesus  in  the  later  Rabbinical  literature.  I  do  not 
merely  refer  to  the  fact  that  almost  all  the  parallels  are  later 
in  date.  I  am  not  thinking  of  the  question,  Upon  which  side 
is  the  originality  ?  When  Talmud  and  Gospels  are  compared, 
the  originaJity^k^most_a]wajs_oja_^the-si^  "But  ' 

this-isnot  my  present  point,  which  is  the  following.  Jewish 
apologists  have  a  habit  of  breaking  up  the  Gospels  into  fragments. 
They  are  somewhat  inclined  to  do  the  same  with  their  own  litera- 
ture. But  a  great  book  is  more  than  its  own  sentences  taken 
singly  or  disjointedly.  A  great  personality  is  more  than  the 
record  of  its  teaching,  and  the  teaching  is  more  than  the  bits  of  it 
taken  one  by  one.  It  must  be  viewed  as  a  whole.  It  must  be 
judged  as  a  whole — so  far,  at  least,  as  this  is  possible.  It  has 
a  spirit,  an  aroma,  which  evaporates  when  its  elements  or  frag- 
ments are  looked  at  separately.  This  piecemeal  way  of  looking 
at  a  book,  a  teaching,  a  person,  is  perhaps  partially  one  of  the 
evil  results  of  Jewish  legalism.  Virtue,  as  Plato  would  say,  is 
cut  up  into  pieces  and  made  into  mincemeat.  It  suffers  in  this 
process.  Virtue  is  more  than  a  parcel  of  virtues;  character  is 
more  than  its  elements.  A  man  is  more  than  the  sum  of  this  and 
that  and  the  other.  Righteousness  is  more  and  other  than  a 
number  of  excellent  positive  commands  and  excellent  negative 
ones. 

There  is  a  certain  spirit  and  glow  about  the  teaching  of 
Jesus  which  you  either  appreciate  or  fail  to  appreciate.  You 
cannot  recognize  or  do  justice  to  it  by  saying,  'The  teaching 
of  Jesus  comprises  the  following  maxims  and  injunctions.  Of 
these  some  are  borrowed  from  the  Old  Testament,  some  are 
paralleled  by  the  Talmud,  and  a  few  are  impracticable.'  The 
teaching  of  Jesus,  which  has  had  such  gigantic  effects  upon  the 


INTRODUCTION  cv 

world,  is  more  and  other  than  a  dissected  list  of  injunctions.     It 
is  not  merely  the  sum  of  its  parts :  it  is  a  whole,  a  spirit. 

That  spirit  has  the  characteristics  of  genius.  It  is  great,  / 
stimulating,  heroic.  One  may  not  always  agree  with  it,  it  may 
not  always  be  '  practical,'  but  it  is  always,  or  nearly  always,  big 
and  grand.  Even  if  you  could  find  separate  close  parallels  for 
970  out  of,  say,  the  1000  verses  in  the  Gospel  in  which  Jesus 
is  the  speaker,  and  even  if  you  put  them  together  and  made 
a  nice  little  book  of  them,  you  would  not  have  produced  a 
substitute  of  equal  religious  value.  The  unity,  the  aroma,  the 
spirit,  the  genius,  would  all  have  fled.  Or,  rather,  you  could  not 
infuse  them  into  your  elegant  collection  of  fragments  and  tit-bits. 
Morceaux  choisis  remain  just  morceaux  ckoisis. 

This  is  by  no  means  to  say  that  a  good  compendium  of 
Kabbinic  ethics  and  religion  would  not  be  very  valuable  and 
helpful  for  our  religious  life.  We  should  be  the  better  for  it. 
We  need  both  the  Rabbinic  compendium  and  the  Gospels.  For 
the  life  of  every  day  we  need  both.  The  great,  heroic  teaching,  and 
the  detailed  and  more  average  teaching.  We  want  them  both. 
The  teaching  which  demands  the  most  complete  self-sacrifice, 
which  is  inspired  by  the  most  thoroughgoing  idealism,  and  the 
teaching  which  is  not  so  far  removed  from,  and  addresses  itself 
more  directly  to,  the  average  righteousness  and  the  average 
wickedness  of  ordinary  and  everyday  life.  As  the  right  condition 
of  the  elementary  school  depends  ultimately  upon  the  University, 
so  average,  ordinary,  humdrum  life  needs — to  keep  it  as  stretched 
as  may  be — the  idealisms  of  ethics  and  religion  which  are  so  much 
above  its  level.  In  hours  of  comfort  and  peace  these  idealisms  are 
needed  all  the  more.  Persecution  and  misery  supply  to  a  great 
extent  their  own  idealisms ;  they  transfigure  the  ordinary  into  the 
heroic.  The  religious  and  ethical  teaching  of  Rabbinic  literature 
is  above  the  level  of  Proverbs  and  Ecclesiasticus  (and  these  too 
have  their  place  and  value),  but  it  deals  perhaps  somewhat  too 
often  in  rather  small  coin.  I  am  speaking  of  the  general  mass, 
and  of  the  spirit  of  the  whole.  A  few  individual  sentences  which 
will  be  quoted  against  me  cannot  suffice  to  prove  the  contrary. 
Just  ordinary  people  need,  in  addition  to  the  admirable  sayings 
and  exhortations  of  the  Rabbis,  the  ideal  and  heroic  spirit  which 
inspires  the  teaching  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels.  'A  man's  reach 
must  exceed  his  grasp ' — just  upon  earth  must  it  do  so,  even  for 
the  non-angelic  beings  that  we  are.  We  know  that  '  little  deeds 
of  kindness  and  charity,  well  within  our  power,'  make  the  wheels 
of  life  run  more  smoothly.  But  the  little  deeds  are  not  enough. 
We  must  not  be  satisfied  with  them.  Or,  rather,  to  keep  them 
sweet  and  clean,  to  multiply  them  and  preserve  them,  one  needs 


cvi  INTRODUCTION 

the  great  deeds  too.  Or,  at  least,  the  desire  for  them,  the  apprecia- 
tion of  them.  We  require  the  heroic  teaching  and  the  example  of 
heroes  to  stimulate  and  call  out  our  own  poor  powers  to  the  full. 
We  require  them  to  make  us  conscious  of  our  own  failures,  to 
destroy  conceit  and  self-righteousness,  to  purge  us  of  anything  like 
moral  Philistinism  or  religious  snobbery.  Religious  and  ethical 
teaching  must  produce  not  merely  right  and  excellent  actions, 
but  also  (and  above  all)  noble  characters.  I  will  not  emphasize 
the  distinction  between  the  commands, '  Do  this '  and  '  Be  this,'  or 
urge  that,  upon  the  whole,  the  Rabbinic  teaching  tends  to  the 
former  type,  and  the  Gospel  teaching  to  the  latter.  Something 
too  much,  perhaps,  has  been  made  of  this  difiference,  though  a 
philosopher  so  removed  from  the  orthodox  Christian  standpoint 
as  Leslie  Stephen  seems  to  press  it.  But  it  is,  at  any  rate,  not 
wholly  unimportant  and  unreal,  and  its  application  to  Talmudic 
and  Gospel  teaching  not  wholly  inaccurate.  It  is  in  a  country 
like  England,  where  the  Jews  have  full  rights  and  complete 
liberty,  that  the  large  demands  and  the  heroic  stature  of  the 
Synoptic  teaching  would  be  of  advantage  for  the  production  of 
noble  and  ideal  personalities,  for  the  production  of  people  who 
grandly  are,  as  well  as  of  those  who  only  rightly  do. 

It  may  be  said  that  there  is  much  in  the  Gospels  and  in  the 
other  books  of  the  New  Testament  to  which  the  Jew  will  always 
take  exception  and  which  he  will  always  regard  as  false  and 
erroneous.  This  is  so,  and  therefore  at  this  time  of  day  it  is 
impossible  for  the  Jew  to  make  his  Bible  include  the  New  Testa- 
ment. To  what  I  said  about  this  matter  in  Vol.  II.  of  my  Bihle 
for  Home  Reading,  pp.  779  and  780,  I  myself  still  adhere.  But 
the  Liberal  Jew  at  any  rate  will  not  be  deterred  from  gaining  all 
the  good  he  can  from  the  Gospels  (or  from  the  rest  of  the  New 
Testament)  because  there  are  many  things  in  it  which  he  holds 
to  be  erroneous.  The  Pentateuch  also  contains  things  which  he 
holds  to  be  erroneous,  it  also  contains  a  lower  and  a  higher.  So 
too  the  Prophets.  But  he  does  not  therefore  reject  them.  He 
regards  them  historically,  and  gratefully  accepts  and  ardently 
treasures  whatever  there  is  in  them  which  is  true  and  good  and 
great.  He  perceives  that  each  section  of  the  Old  Testament  has 
in  it  something  special,  invaluable,  unique.  He  would  not  dis- 
pense with  the  Law  because  he  has  the  Prophets,  or  with  the 
Wisdom  literature  because  he  has  the  Prophets  and  the  Law. 
Even  within  the  Prophets  themselves,  he  would  not  dispense  with 
Jeremiah  because  he  has  Isaiah,  or  with  the  '  minor '  prophets 
because  he  has  Isaiah,  Jeremiah,  and  Ezekiel.  In  the  same  way, 
he  will,  I  believe,  be  glad  to  study  and  absorb  (even  though  they 
are  not  a  portion  of  his  '  Bible ')  the  Gospels  and  the  other  books 


INTRODUCTION  cvii 

of  the  New  Testament.  They  too  are  sui  generis ;  they  too  can 
add  something  of  value  and  power,  something  fresh  and  distin- 
guished, to  his  total  religious  store. 

These  remarks  are  general  and  tentative.  They  make  no 
attempt  to  estimate  the  teaching  of  Jesus  as  a  whole,  or  its  right 
place  in  modern  Judaism,  or  its  measure  of  novelty  and  truth. 
And  if  they  do  not  attempt  this,  the  commentary  will  not  do  so 
either.  It  will  give  a  few  suggestions  and  incidental  appreciations ; 
nothing  more.  The  same  limitation  holds  for  the  question  as  to 
the  attitude  which  Judaism  is  to  take  up  towards  the  Gospel  hero 
himself.  For  the  teaching  of  Jesus  is  not  put  forward  in  the 
Gospels  as  a  philosopher  puts  forward  his  teaching  impersonally  in 
a  book.  It  is  bound  up  with  a  certain  life  and  character.  This 
question  has  been  also  alluded  to  in  the  previous  section  of  this 
Introduction,  and  a  brief  hint  given  as  to  the  sort  of  solution  in 
which  the  present  writer  is  himself  inclined  to  believe.  Let  me 
add  this  one  further  remark.  Whether  the  life  and  character  of 
Jesus,  as  they  can  be  inferred  from  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  or  as 
they  are  presented  to  us  in  those  writings,  are  completely  historic 
or  no  is  undoubtedly  a  question  of  the  gravest  moment.  But  it 
does  not  follow  that  this  life  and  character  are  of  no  value,  because 
we  can  never  determine  their  precise  proportions  of  truth  and  error. 
We  can  derive  some  help  from  the  life  of  Moses  as  presented  to  us  in 
the  Pentateuch,  even  though  we  are  aware  that  that  life  as  thus  pre- 
sented is  by  no  means  wholly  historic.  Such  a  use  of  such  an  'ideal' 
biography  is  not  to  be  deprecated.  A  similar  use  has  been  and 
can  be  made  of  the  life  of  Jesus  as  presented  to  us  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels.  That  life,  too,  is  partly  '  ideal,'  but  it  may  be  a  great  and 
inspiring  ideal  none  the  less.  In  such  a  light  it  may  be  possible 
for  the  Liberal  Jew  at  any  rate  to  regard  it,  and  it  may  become 
for  him  a  great  and  valuable  religious  asset.  Especially  for  those 
who  feel  that  Liberal  Judaism  is  largely  prophetic  Judaism,  will 
the  prophet  of  Nazareth — as  his  contemporaries  with  true  instinct 
entitled  him — be  cherished  and  admired.  Perhaps  in  the  future 
Christianity  and  Judaism  will  be  able  to  shake  hands  over  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount  and  the  fundamental  elements  in  the  moral 
and  religious  doctrine  of  Jesus.  They  will  perhaps  allow  the  vexed 
question  of  originality  to  slumber.  A  great  Christiaa  scholar  has 
said  (Paul  Wernle,  The  Sources  of  our  Knowledge  of  the  Life  of 
Jesus,  E.T.,  pp.  162,  163),  'What  is  crucial'  in  the  words  of  Jesus 
is  'trust  in  God,  purity  of  heart,  compassion,  humility,  forgiveness, 
aspiration — this  and  nothing  else.  This  is  the  will  of  God,  as 
epitomised  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount ;  he  who  does  it  is  Jesus' 
mother  and  sister  and  brother.'  Assuredly,  if  this  be  so,  there  have 
been  very  many  Jewish  mothers  and  sisters  and  brothers  of  Jesus 


cvm  INTRODUCTION 

all  these  long  years  from  Jesus  until  now.  For  Jewish  teachers 
have  never  ceased  to  say  that  these  things  were  the  essential  will 
of  God,  and  many  Jews  and  Jewesses  have  never  ceased  to  practise 
them.  And,  lastly,  may  I  venture  to  hint  at  one  reason  why  it  is 
that,  in  the  words  of  the  great  scholar, '  what  the  Master  desired 
first  and  before  all  things  shines  forth  upon  us  out  of  the  Gospel 
to-day'  so  brightly  and  wonderfully,  and  why  it  seems  to  be  so 
much  more  a  discovery  to  him  than  to  his  Jewish  reader  ?  Is  it 
not  because,  to  quote  his  own  words  again,  he  and  those  who  feel 
with  him  'have  been  satiated  with  Christology  even  to  nausea,' 
and  therefore  doubtless  '  long  for  God '  ?  The  Jew,  on  the  other 
hand,  has  always  rejected  all  Christology,  and  has  ever  found  his 
way,  direct  and  without  a  mediator,  to  the  Divine  Father. 


EAST  LONDON  FUND  FOR  THE  JEWS. 


Lending  and  Reference  Library. 


MARK 


CHAPTER  I 

The  beginning  of  the  gospel  concerning  Jesus  Christ,  the 
Son  of  God.  As  it  is  written  in  Isaiah  the  prophet,  '  Behold, 
I  send  my  messenger  before  thee,  who  shall  prepare  the  way  for 
thee.  The  voice  of  one  crying  in  the  wilderness,  Prepare  ye 
the  way  of  the  Lord,  make  his  paths  straight.'  So  John  the 
Baptist  appeared  in  the  wilderness,  proclaiming  the  baptism  of 
repentance  for  the  forgiveness  of  sins.  And  there  went  out 
unto  him  all  the  land  of  Judaea,  and  all  the  inhabitants  of  Jeru- 
salem, and  they  were  baptized  by  him  in  the  river  of  Jordan, 
confessing  their  sins.  And  John's  clothing  was  of  camel's  hair, 
and  he  had  a  leathern  girdle  about  his  loins ;  and  he  ate  locusts 
and  wild  honey.  And  he  proclaimed,  saying,  'After  me  cometh 
one  who  is  mightier  than  I,  the  latchet  of  whose  shoes  I  am  not 
worthy  to  stoop  down  and  unloose.  I  have  baptized  you  with 
water:  but  he  will  baptize  you  with  the  Holy  Spirit.' 

And  it  came  to  pass  in  those  days,  that  Jesus  came  from 
Nazareth  in  Galilee,  and  was  baptized  by  John  in  the  Jordan. 
And  straightway  as  he  came  up  out  of  the  water,  he  saw  how 
the  heavens  parted,  and  the  Spirit  like  a  dove  descended  upon 
him.  And  a  voice  from  heaven  said, '  Thou  art  my  beloved  Son ; 
in  thee  I  am  well  pleased.' 

And  immediately  the  spirit  drove  him  into  the  wilderness. 
And  he  was  in  the  wilderness  forty  days,  being  tempted  of  Satan ; 
and  he  was  with  the  wild  beasts,  and  the  angels  ministered  unto 
him. 

Now  after  John  was  thrown  into  prison,  Jesus  came  into 
Galilee,  and  proclaimed  the  good  tidings  of  God,  saying,  'The 


2  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

time  is  fulfilled,  and  the  kingdom  of  God  hath  drawn  nigh ;  repent 
ye,  and  believe  in  the  good  tidings.' 

Now  as  he  walked  along  the  lake  of  Galilee,  he  saw  Simon 
and  Andrew  his  brother  casting  a  net  into  the  lake :  for  they 
were  fishermen.  And  Jesus  said  unto  them,  '  Come  ye  after  me, 
and  I  will  make  you  become  fishers  of  men.'  And  straightway 
they  left  their  nets,  and  followed  him.  And  when  he  had  gone  a 
little  further,  he  saw  James  the  son  of  Zebedee,  and  John  his 
brother,  who  were  also  in  a  boat,  mending  their  nets.  And 
straightway  he  called  them :  and  they  left  their  father  Zebedee 
in  the  boat  with  the  hired  servants,  and  went  after  him. 

And  they  went  into  Capernaum;  and  straightway  on  the 
sabbath  day  he  entered  into  the  synagogue,  and  taught.  And 
they  were  amazed  at  his  teaching,  for  he  taught  them  as  one 
having  authority,  and  not  as  the  scribes. 

And  straightway  there  was  in  their  synagogue  a  man  with 
an  unclean  spirit ;  and  he  cried  out,  saying,  '  What  have  we  to 
do  with  thee,  Jesus  of  Nazareth  ?  art  thou  come  to  destroy  us  ? 
I  know  thee  who  thou  art,  the  Holy  One  of  God.'  And  Jesus 
rebuked  it,  saying,  '  Hold  thy  peace,  and  come  out  of  him.'  And 
the  unclean  spirit  tore  him,  and  cried  with  a  loud  voice,  and  came 
out  of  him.  And  they  all  marvelled,  so  that  they  discussed  among 
themselves,  saying,  'What  is  this  ?  a  new  teaching  with  authority! 
And  he  commands  the  unclean  spirits,  and  they  obey  him ! '  And 
immediately  his  fame  spread  abroad  throughout  all  the  region  of 
Galilee. 

And  forthwith,  when  they  had  come  out  of  the  synagogue, 
they  entered  into  the  house  of  Simon  and  Andrew,  with  James 
and  John.  But  Simon's  wife's  mother  lay  in  bed  with  a  fever, 
and  they  told  him  of  her.  And  he  came  and  took  her  by  the 
hand,  and  raised  her  up;  and  the  fever  left  her,  and  she  waited 
on  them. 

And  in  the  evening,  when  the  sun  had  set,  they  brought 
unto  him  all  that  were  diseased,  and  them  that  were  possessed 
with  demons.  And  all  the  city  was  gathered  together  at  the 
door.  And  he  healed  many  that  were  sick  with  divers  diseases, 
and  cast  out  many  demons ;  and  he  permitted  not  the  demons  to 
speak,  because  they  knew  him. 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  3 

And  in  the  morning,  very  early,  before  the  dawn,  he  rose 
up,  and  left  the  house,  and  went  to  a  solitary  place,  and  there 
prayed.  And  Simon  and  his  companions  pursued  him.  And  when 
they  found  him,  they  said  unto  him,  'All  seek  for  thee.'  And 
he  said  unto  them,  '  Let  us  go  elsewhere,  into  the  neighbouring 
villages,  that  I  may  preach  there  also:  for  to  that  end  I  came 
out.'  And  he  went  and  preached  in  their  synagogues  throughout 
all  Galilee,  and  cast  out  demons. 

And  there  came  a  leper  to  him,  beseeching  him,  and  kneeling 
down  to  him,  and  saying  unto  him, '  If  thou  wilt,  thou  canst  make 
me  clean.'  And  Jesus,  moved  with  compassion,  put  forth  his  hand, 
and  touched  him,  and  said  unto  him, '  I  will ;  be  cleansed.'  And 
immediately  the  leprosy  departed  from  him,  and  he  was  cleansed. 
And  he  sternly  charged  him,  and  forthwith  sent  him  out,  and 
said  unto  him,  '  See  thou  say  nothing  to  any  man :  but  go,  shew 
thyself  to  the  priest,  and  offer  for  thy  cleansing  what  Moses  com- 
manded, for  a  testimony  unto  them.'  But  when  he  went  out,  he 
began  to  publish  it  much,  and  to  spread  the  story  abroad,  so  that 
Jesus  could  no  more  openly  enter  into  any  city,  but  he  remained 
outside  in  lonely  places :  and  they  came  to  him  from  every  quarter. 

CHAPTER  II 

And  when  after  some  days  he  returned  to  Capernaum,  it 
was  reported  that  he  was  in  the  house.  And  many  collected 
together,  so  that  there  was  no  room  to  hold  them  even  before 
the  door;  and  he  spoke  the  Word  unto  them.  And  some  came 
unto  him,  bringing  a  paralyzed  man,  who  was  carried  by  four. 
And  aa  they  could  not  bring  the  man  up  to  Jesus  on  account 
of  the  crowd,  they  took  him  on  to  the  roof  of  the  house  where 
Jesus  was,  and  having  made  a  hole  through  it,  they  let  down  the 
bed  whereon  the  paralyzed  man  lay.  When  Jesus  saw  their  faith, 
he  said  unto  the  paralyzed  man,  '  Son,  thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee.' 
But  some  scribes  were  sitting  there,  who  argued  in  their  hearts, 
'What  blasphemy  does  this  man  say?  who  can  forgive  sins  but 
God  alone  ? '  And  immediately  Jesus  perceived  in  his  spirit  that 
they  so  argued  within  themselves,  and  he  said  unto  them, '  Why 
argue  ye  thus  in  your  hearts?     Which  is  easier:  to  say  to  the 

I — 2 


4  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

paralyzed  man,  Thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee;  or  to  say,  Arise,  and 
take  up  thy  bed  and  walk  ?  But  that  ye  may  see  that  the  Son  of 
man  hath  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins,'  (he  said  to  the  paralyzed 
man),  '  I  say  unto  thee.  Arise,  and  take  up  thy  bed,  and  go  home.' 
And  he  arose,  and  at  once  took  up  the  bed,  and  weat  forth  before 
them  all ;  so  that  they  were  all  utterly  amazed,  and  glorified  God, 
saying,  '  We  never  saw  anything  like  this  before.' 

And  he  went  forth  again  by  the  lake  side ;  and  all  the  crowd 
resorted  unto  him,  and  he  taught  them.  And  as  he  passed  by,  he 
saw  Levi  the  son  of  Alphseus  sitting  at  the  tax  house,  and  he  said 
unto  him,  '  Follow  me.'  And  he  arose  and  followed  him.  And  it 
came  to  pass,  that  Jesus  sat  at  table  in  his  house,  and  many  tax- 
collectors  and  sinners  sat  also  with  Jesus  and  his  disciples:  for 
there  were  many  who  followed  him.  And  when  the  scribes  of  the 
Pharisees  saw  him  eat  with  tax-collectors  and  sinners,  they  said 
unto  his  disciples,  '  Why  does  he  eat  with  tax-collectors  and 
sinners  ? '  And  Jesus  heard  it  and  said  unto  them,  '  The  strong 
have  no  need  of  the  physician,  but  they  that  are  sick  ;  I  came  not 
to  call  the  righteous,  but  the  sinners.' 

And  the  disciples  of  John  and  the  Pharisees  used  to  fast.  And 
some  people  came  and  said  unto  him,  'Why  do  the  disciples  of 
John  and  of  the  Pharisees  fast,  but  thy  disciples  fast  not  ? '  And 
Jesus  said  unto  them,  'Can  the  wedding  guests  fast,  while  the 
bridegroom  is  with  them  ?  As  long  as  they  have  the  bridegroom 
with  them,  they  cannot  fast.  But  the  days  will  come,  when  the 
brid'egroom  will  be  taken  away  from  them,  and  then  they  will  fast 
in  those  days. 

'No  man  seweth  a  piece  of  undressed  cloth  on  to  an  old 
garment :  for,  if  he  do,  the  patch  draggeth  away  from  it,  the  new 
from  the  old,  and  the  rent  is  made  worse.  And  no  man  poureth 
new  wine  into  old  wine  skins :  for,  if  he  do,  the  wine  doth  burst 
the  skins,  and  the  wine  is  lost  as  well  as  the  skins,  [But  new 
wine  for  new  skins !] ' 

And  it  came  to  pass  that  he  went  through  some  corn  fields  on 
the  sabbath  day ;  and  his  disciples  began,  as  they  went,  to  pluck 
the  ears  of  corn.  And  the  Pharisees  said  unto  him, '  See,  how  they 
do  what  is  not  permitted  on  the  sabbath  day ! '  And  he  said  unto 
them,  'Have  ye  never  read  what  David  did,  when  he  had  need, 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  5 

and  he  and  they  that  were  with  him  were  hungry  ?  How  he  went 
into  the  house  of  God,  while  Abiathar  was  high  priest,  and  ate  the 
shewbread,  which  only  the  priests  may  eat,  and  how  he  gave  it 
also  to  them  who  were  with  him  ? '  And  he  said  unto  them, '  The 
sabbath  was  made  for  man,  and  not  man  for  the  sabbath :  there- 
fore the  Son  of  man  is  lord  also  of  the  sabbath.' 


CHAPTER  III 

And  he  entered  on  another  occasion  into  the  synagogue ;  and 
there  was  a  man  there  who  had  a  withered  hand.  And  they  kept 
watching  him,  to  see  whether  he  would  heal  him  on  the  sabbath 
day;  so  that  they  might  accuse  him.  And  he  said  unto  the  man 
who  had  the  withered  hand, '  Stand  up  and  come  forward.'  And 
he  said  unto  them,  'Is  it  permitted  to  do  good  on  the  sabbath 
rather  than  to  do  evil  ?  to  save  life  rather  than  to  kill  it  ? '  But 
they  held  their  peace.  And  he  looked  round  on  them  with  anger, 
being  grieved  for  the  hardness  of  their  hearts,  and  he  said  unto  the 
man,  '  Stretch  out  thine  hand.'  And  he  stretched  it  out :  and  his 
hand  was  restored.  And  the  Pharisees  went  out,  and  straightway 
took  counsel  with  the  Herodians  against  him,  how  they  might 
destroy  him. 

But  Jesus  with  his  disciples  retired  to  the  lake ;  and  a  great 
multitude  from  Galilee  followed  him ;  and  from  Judaea,  and  from 
Jerusalem,  and  from  Idumsea,  and  beyond  Jordan,  and  about  Tyre 
and  Sidon,  a  great  multitude,  who  had  heard  what  great  things  he 
did,  came  unto  him.  And  he  told  his  disciples  to  have  a  boat 
ready  for  him,  so  that  he  might  not  be  crushed  by  the  crowd. 
For  he  had  healed  many,  so  that  all  who  were  afflicted  pressed 
upon  him  in  order  to  touch  him.  And  the  unclean  spirits,  when 
they  saw  him,  fell  down  before  him,  and  screamed,  saying,  'Thou 
art  the  Son  of  God.'  And  he  rebuked  them  much  that  they 
should  not  make  him  known. 

And  he  went  up  on  to  the  mountain,  and  called  unto  him 
whom  he  desired;  and  they  came  unto  him.  And  he  appointed 
twelve  to  be  with  him,  and  to  send  them  forth  to  preach,  and  to 
have  power  to  cast  out  demons.  So  he  appointed  the  Twelve,  and 
Simon  he  surnamed  Peter.     And  (he  appointed)  James  the  son  of 


6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

Zebedee,  and  John  the  brother  of  James,  whom  he  surnamed 
Boanerges,  which  is,  sons  of  thunder,  and  Andrew,  and  Philip,  and 
Bartholomew,  and  Matthew,  and  Thomas,  and  James  the  son  of 
Alphseus,  and  Thaddeus,  and  Simon  the  Canaanite,  and  Judas 
Iscaiiot,  who  betrayed  him. 

And  he  went  into  an  house.  And  a  crowd  collected  together 
again,  so  that  they  could  not  even  eat  bread.  And  when  his 
relatives  heard  of  these  things,  they  set  forth  to  lay  hold  of  him : 
for  they  said,  '  He  is  out  of  his  mind.' 

And  the  scribes  who  came  from  Jerusalem  said,  'He  has 
Beelzebul,  and  by  the  ruler  of  the  demons  he  casts  out  demons.' 
And  he  called  them  unto  him,  and  said  unto  them  by  way  of 
parable,  '  How  can  Satan  cast  out  Satan  ?  And  if  a  kingdom  be 
divided  against  itself,  that  kingdom  cannot  endure.  And  if  a 
house  be  divided  against  itself,  that  house  cannot  endure.  And  if 
Satan  rise  up  against  himself,  and  be  divided,  he  cannot  endure, 
but  cometh  to  an  end.  No  man  can  enter  into  a  strong  man's 
house,  and  plunder  his  goods,  unless  he  first  bind  the  strong  man; 
and  then  he  can  plunder  his  house.  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  All  the 
sins  and  blasphemies  wherewith  the  sons  of  men  blaspheme,  shall 
be  forgiven  them,  but  he  that  blasphemeth  against  the  Holy  Spirit 
hath  no  forgiveness  for  ever,  but  is  guilty  of  eternal  sin.'  Because 
they  said,  '  He  has  an  unclean  spirit.' 

And  his  mother  and  his  brothers  came,  and,  standing  outside, 
sent  unto  him  to  call  him.  And  a  crowd  was  sitting  round  him, 
and  they  said  unto  him,  '  Behold,  thy  mother  and  thy  brothers  are 
outside  and  seek  thee.'  And  he  answered  them,  saying,  'Who  is 
my  mother,  or  my  brothers  ? '  And  he  looked  at  those  who  sat 
around  him,  and  said,  '  Behold  my  mother  and  my  brothers.  For 
whoever  doeth  the  will  of  God,  he  is  to  me  brother,  and  sister,  and 
mother.' 

CHAPTER  IV 

And  he  began  again  to  teach  by  the  lake  side :  and  there  was 
gathered  unto  him  a  great  crowd,  so  that  he  entered  into  a  boat, 
and  sat  therein  on  the  lake ;  and  the  whole  crowd  was  by  the  lake 
on  the  land.     And  he  taught  them  many  things  in  parables,  and 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  7 

said  unto  them  in  his  teaching:  'Hearken:  behold,  there  went 
out  a  sower  to  sow.  And  it  came  to  pass,  as  he  sowed,  some  seed 
fell  on  the  way  side,  and  the  birds  of  the  air  came  and  devoured 
it  up.  And  some  fell  on  stony  ground,  where  it  had  not  much 
earth :  and  it  sprang  up  quickly,  because  it  had  no  depth  of  earth. 
But  when  the  sun  rose  up,  it  was  scorched ;  and  because  it  had 
no  root,  it  withered  away.  And  some  fell  among  thorns,  and  the 
thorns  grew  up,  and  choked  it,  and  it  bore  no  crop.  But  som& 
seed  fell  on  good  ground,  and  bore  a  crop  which  sprang  up  and 
increased,  and  yielded  thirty,  and  sixty,  and  even  an  hundred 
fold.'  And  he  said  unto  them,  'He  that  hath  ears  to  hear,  let 
him  hear.' 

And  when  he  was  alone,  they  that  were  about  him,  together 
with  the  Twelve,  asked  him  concerning  the  parables.  And  he 
said  unto  them, '  Unto  you  is  given  the  mystery  of  the  kingdom 
of  God :  but  unto  them  that  are  without,  all  is  said  in  parables ; 
in  order  that  seeing  they  may  see,  and  not  perceive ;  and  hearing 
they  may  hear,  and  not  understand ;  lest  they  should  return,  and 
be  forgiven.' 

And  he  said  unto  them, '  Ye  understand  not  this  parable  ?  how 
then  will  ye  understand  all  the  other  parables  ? 

'The  sower  soweth  the  Word.  And  these  are  they  by  the  way 
side :  there  the  Word  is  sown,  and  when  they  have  heard  it,  Satan 
Cometh  immediately,  and  taketh  away  the  Word  which  was  sown 
in  them.  And  these  are  they  who  are,  as  it  were,  sown  on  stony 
ground ;  who,  when  they  have  heard  the  Word,  immediately  receive 
it  with  gladness :  but  they  have  no  root  in  themselves,  and  so 
endure  but  for  a  time:  afterward,  when  aflSiction  or  persecution 
ariseth  for  the  Word's  sake,  immediately  they  fall  away.  And 
these  are  they  who  are  sown  among  thorns ;  these  hear  the  Word, 
but  the  cares  of  the  world,  and  the  deceitfulness  of  riches,  and 
the  other  desires  enter  in,  and  choke  the  Word,  and  it  remaineth 
unfruitful.  And  these  are  they  who  are  sown  on  good  ground; 
who  hear  the  Word  and  receive  it,  and  bear  a  crop,  thirty,  and 
sixty,  and  even  an  hundred  fold.' 

And  he  said  unto  them,  'Is  the  lamp  brought  in  to  be  put 
under  the  bushel,  or  under  the  bed  ?  and  not  rather  to  be  placed 
on  the   stand  ?     For  there  is  nothing  hid,  which   shall  not  be 


8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

revealed ;   neither  was  any  thing  kept  secret,  but  that  it  should 
come  to  light.     Who  hath  ears  to  hear,  let  him  hear.' 

And  he  said  unto  them,  '  Take  heed  what  ye  hear :  with  what 
measure  ye  mete,  it  shall  be  measured  to  you,  and  even  more 
shall  be  added  thereto.  For  he  that  hath,  to  him  shall  be  given : 
and  he  that  hath  not,  from  him  shall  be  taken  even  that  which 
he  hath.' 

And  he  said, '  The  kingdom  of  God  is  as  if  a  man  should  cast 
seed  into  the  ground ;  and  he  sleepeth  and  ariseth,  night  and  day, 
and  the  seed  sprouteth  and  groweth  up,  he  knoweth  not  how. 
For  of  herself  the  earth  bringeth  forth  her  crop ;  first  the  blade, 
then  the  ear,  after  that  the  full  com  in  the  ear.  But  when  the 
crop  is  ready,  immediately  he  sendeth  forth  the  sickle,  because  the 
harvest  hath  come.' 

And  he  said, '  Whereunto  shall  we  liken  the  kingdom  of  God  ? 
or  with  what  parable  shall  we  represent  it  ?  It  is  like  a  grain  of 
mustard  seed,  which,  when  it  is  sown  in  the  earth,  is  less  than 
all  the  seeds  that  are  in  the  earth.  But  when  it  is  sown,  it 
groweth  up,  and  becometh  greater  than  all  herbs,  and  throweth 
out  great  branches :  so  that  the  birds  of  the  air  can  lodge  under 
the  shadow  of  it.' 

And  with  many  such  parables  spake  he  the  Word  unto  them, 
as  they  were  able  to  understand  it.  And  without  a  parable  spake 
he  not  unto  them :  but  when  they  were  alone,  he  explained  every- 
thing to  his  disciples. 

And  the  same  day,  when  the  even  was  come,  he  said  unto 
them,  '  Let  us  cross  over  unto  the  other  side.'  And  when  they 
had  dismissed  the  crowd,  they  took  him,  even  as  he  was,  in  the 
boat.  And  there  arose  a  great  storm  of  wind,  and  the  waves  beat 
upon  the  boat,  so  that  it  became  full.  And  he  was  in  the  stern  of 
the  boat,  asleep  on  a  pillow :  and  they  awoke  him,  and  said  unto 
him,  '  Master,  carest  thou  not  that  we  perish  ? '  And  he  arose,  and 
rebuked  the  wind,  and  said  [unto  the  sea], '  Peace,  be  still.'  And 
the  wind  dropped,  and  there  was  a  great  calm.  And  he  said  unto 
them,  'Why  are  ye  so  fearful  ?  have  ye  still  no  faith  ? '  And  they 
feared  exceedingly,  and  said  one  to  another,  'Who  is  this  man, 
that  even  the  wind  and  the  sea  obey  him?' 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK 


CHAPTER  V 

And  they  came  unto  the  other  side  of  the  lake,  to  the  country 
of  the  Gadarenes.  And  as  he  landed  from  the  boat,  immediately 
there  met  him  [out  of  the  tombs]  a  man  with  an  unclean  spirit, 
who  dwelt  among  the  tombs.  And  nobody  had  been  able  to  bind 
him  even  with  a  chain :  for  he  had  been  often  bound  with  fetters 
and  chains,  but  the  chains  had  been  torn  asunder  by  him,  and  the 
fetters  broken  in  pieces  :  and  no  one  was  strong  enough  to  subdue 
him.  And  always,  night  and  day,  he  was  in  the  mountains  and 
in  the  tombs,  shrieking,  and  cutting  himself  with  stones.  But 
when  he  saw  Jesus  afar  off,  he  ran  and  fell  down  before  him,  and 
cried  with  a  loud  voice,  and  said,  'What  have  I  to  do  with  thee, 
Jesus,  thou  Son  of  the  most  high  God  ?  I  adjure  thee  by  God, 
that  thou  torment  me  not.'  (For  Jesus  had  said  unto  him, '  Come 
out  of  the  man,  thou  unclean  spirit.')  And  Jesus  asked  him, 
'What  is  thy  name?'  And  he  answered,  saying,  'My  name  is 
Legion :  for  we  are  many.'  And  he  besought  him  much  that  he 
would  not  send  them  away  out  of  the  land.  Now  there  was  there 
upon  the  mountain  a  great  herd  of  swine  feeding.  And  they 
besought  him,  saying,  '  Send  us  into  the  swine,  that  we  may 
enter  into  them.'  And  Jesus  gave  them  leave.  And  the  unclean 
spirits  went  out,  and  entered  into  the  swine :  and  the  herd  rushed 
down  the  cliff  into  the  lake,  (they  were  about  two  thousand) ;  and 
they  were  drowned  in  the  lake.  And  the  swineherds  fled,  and 
told  the  story  in  the  city  and  in  the  country.  And  the  people 
came  out  to  see  what  had  happened.  And  they  came  to  Jesus,  and 
saw  him  that  was  possessed  with  the  demon,  sitting  down,  clothed 
and  in  his  right  mind :  and  they  were  afraid.  And  the  eye- 
witnesses told  them  what  had  happened  to  him  that  was  possessed 
with  the  demon,  and  also  about  the  swine.  And  they  began  to 
entreat  him  to  depart  out  of  their  territory.  And  as  he  was 
getting  into  the  boat,  the  man  who  had  been  possessed  with  the 
demon  entreated  him  that  he  might  go  with  him.  Howbeit  Jesus 
permitted  him  not,  but  said  unto  him,  'Go  home  to  thine  own 
people,  and  tell  them  what  great  things  the  Lord  has  done  for 
thee,  and   how   he   has  had  compassion  upon  thee.'     And   he 


lO  THE   SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

departed,  and  began  to  proclaim  publicly  in  the  Ten  Cities  what 
great  things  Jesus  had  done  for  him :  and  all  were  amazed. 

And  when  Jesus  had  crossed  over  again  in  the  boat  unto  the 
other  side,  a  great  crowd  gathered  unto  him,  and  stood  by  the 
edge  of  the  lake.  And,  behold,  there  came  one  of  the  rulers  of 
the  synagogue,  Jairus  by  name ;  and  when  he  saw  him,  he  fell  at 
his  feet,  and  besought  him  greatly,  saying,  'My  little  daughter  Ues 
at  the  point  of  death :  come  and  lay  thy  hands  on  her,  that  she 
may  be  healed,  and  may  live.' 

And  Jesus  went  with  him ;  and  a  great  crowd  followed  him, 
and  pressed  around  him.  And  a  woman,  who  had  had  an  issue 
of  blood  twelve  years,  and  had  suffered  much  from  many  physicians, 
and  had  spent  all  her  fortune,  and  was  not  benefited,  but  rather 
grew  worse,  having  heard  the  tales  about  Jesus,  came  up  in  the 
crowd,  and  touched  his  garment  from  behind.  For  she  thought, 
'  If  I  only  touch  his  clothes,  I  shall  be  cured.'  And  straightway 
the  source  of  her  issue  dried  up ;  and  she  felt  in  her  body  that 
she  was  healed  of  her  afiSiction.  And  Jesus,  realizing  immediately 
that  power  had  gone  out  of  him,  turned  round  in  the  crowd,  and 
said,  'Who  touched  my  clothes  ?'  And  his  disciples  said  unto  him, 
'  Thou  seest  the  crowd  pressing  around  thee,  and  thou  sayest, 
Who  touched  me  ?'  And  he  looked  round  to  see  who  it  was  that 
had  done  it.  But  the  woman,  fearing  and  trembling — for  she 
knew  what  had  befallen  her — came  and  fell  down  before  him,  and 
told  him  all  the  truth.  But  he  said  unto  her,  'Daughter,  thy 
faith  has  cured  thee ;  go  in  peace,  and  be  healed  of  thy  aflaiction.' 

While  he  yet  spake,  there  came  some  men  from  the  ruler  of 
the  synagogue's  house,  and  said,  'Thy  daughter  is  dead:  why 
troublest  thou  the  Master  any  further?'  But  Jesus  overheard  the 
word  that  was  spoken,  and  said  unto  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue, 
'  Be  not  afraid ;  have  but  faith.'  And  he  allowed  no  man  to  go 
on  with  him,  except  Peter,  and  James,  and  John  the  brother  of 
James.  And  they  came  to  the  house  of  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue, 
and  he  heard  an  uproar,  for  they  wept  and  wailed  loudly.  And 
when  he  had  entered  in,  he  said  unto  them, '  Why  make  ye  this 
uproar,  and  weep  ?  the  child  is  not  dead,  but  sleeps.'  And  tiiey 
laughed  him  to  scorn.  But  he  drove  them  all  out,  and  took  with 
him  only  the  father  and  the  mother  of  the  child,  and  his  com- 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  11 

panions,  and  entered  in  where  the  child  was  lying.  And  he  took 
the  hand  of  the  child,  and  said  unto  her, '  Talitha  cumi ' ;  which 
is,  being  interpreted,  '  Maiden,  I  say  unto  thee,  arise.'  And 
straightway  the  girl  arose,  and  walked ;  for  she  was  twelve  years 
old.  And  they  were  utterly  beside  themselves  with  amazement. 
And  he  strictly  ordered  them  that  no  maa  should  know  it ;  and 
he  said  that  something  should  be  given  her  to  eat. 


CHAPTER  VI 

And  he  went  out  from  thence,  and  entered  into  his  native 
city;  and  his  disciples  followed  him.  And  when  the  sabbath  day 
was  come,  he  began  to  teach  in  the  synagogue:  and  many,  hearing 
him,  were  astonished,  saying,  '  Whence  has  this  come  to  him  ? 
what  wisdom  is  this  which  has  been  given  unto  him  ?  and  have 
such  miracles  been  wrought  by  his  hands?  Is  he  not  the 
carpenter,  the  son  of  Mary,  the  brother  of  James,  and  Joses,  and 
Juda,  and  Simon?  and  are  not  his  sisters  here  with  us?'  And 
they  took  offence  at  him.  But  Jesus  said  unto  them,  'A  prophet 
is  not  without  honour,  except  in  his  own  city,  and  among  his 
kin,  and  in  his  house.'  And  he  could  not  perform  there  a  single 
miracle,  save  that  he  laid  his  hands  upon  a  few  sick  folk,  and 
healed  them.  And  he  marvelled  because  of  their  unbelief.  So  he 
went  about  the  villages  around,  teaching. 

And  he  called  unto  him  the  Twelve,  and  began  to  send  them 
forth  by  two  and  two;  and  he  gave  them  power  over  unclean 
spirits ;  and  he  commanded  them  that  they  should  take  nothing 
for  their  journey,  save  a  staff  only;  no  bread,  no  wallet,  no  money 
in  their  purse.  They  were  only  to  be  shod  with  sandals;  and 
they  were  not  to  put  on  two  coats.  And  he  said  unto  them, 
'Wheresoever  ye  enter  into  an  house,  there  abide  till  ye  depart 
thence.  And  whatever  place  will  not  receive  you,  nor  hear  you, 
depart  thence,  and  shake  off  the  dust  under  your  feet,  as  a 
testimony  against  them.'  And  they  went  forth,  and  preached 
that  men  should  repent.  And  they  cast  out  many  demons,  and 
anointed  with  oil  many  that  were  sick,  and  healed  them. 

And  king  Herod  heard  of  him  :  for  his  name  became  known. 


12  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

And  some  said,  'John  the  Baptist  is  risen  from  the  dead,  and 
therefore  miraculous  powers  are  active  in  him.'  Others  said,  'It 
is  Elijah.'  And  others  said,  '  He  is  a  prophet,  like  one  of  the 
prophets.'  But  when  Herod  heard  of  him,  he  said,  'John,  whom 
I  beheaded,  is  risen  from  the  dead.' 

For  Herod  himself  had  sent  and  seized  John,  and  bound  him 
in  prison  on  account  of  Herodias,  his  brother  Philip's  wife:  for  he 
had  married  her.  For  John  had  said  unto  Herod,  'It  is  not 
lawful  for  thee  to  have  thy  brother's  wife.'  Therefore  Herodias 
hated  him,  and  would  have  killed  him,  but  she  could  not:  for 
Herod  feared  John,  knowing  that  he  was  a  righteous  and  holy 
man,  and  he  protected  him;  and  when  he  heard  him,  he  was  much 
perplexed,  and  yet  he  heard  him  gladly.  Now  on  an  opportune 
day,  when  Herod  on  his  birthday  gave  a  banquet  to  his  lords  and 
high  captains,  and  to  the  chief  men  of  Galilee,  the  daughter  of 
Herodias  came  in,  and  danced,  and  pleased  Herod  and  his  guests. 
And  the  king  said  unto  the  damsel, '  Ask  of  me  whatsoever  thou 
wilt,  and  I  will  give  it  thee.'  And  he  sware  unto  her,  'What- 
soever thou  shalt  ask  of  me,  I  will  give  it  thee,  even  unto  the 
half  of  my  kingdom.'  And  she  went  forth,  and  said  unto  her 
mother,  '  What  shall  I  ask  ? '  And  she  said,  '  The  head  of  John 
the  Baptist.'  And  she  went  in  straightway  with  haste  unto  the 
king,  and  asked,  saying,  '  I  wish  that  thou  give  me  forthwith  the 
head  of  John  the  Baptist  on  a  dish.'  And  the  king  was  exceeding 
sorry;  yet  on  account  of  his  oath,  and  on  account  of  his  guests, 
he  did  not  like  to  refuse  her.  So  the  king  at  once  sent  an 
executioner,  and  ordered  him  to  bring  John's  head :  and  he  went, 
and  beheaded  him  in  the  prison,  and  brought  his  head  on  a  dish, 
and  gave  it  to  the  damsel :  and  the  damsel  gave  it  to  her  mother. 
And  when  his  disciples  heard  of  it,  they  came  and  took  away  his 
corpse,  and  buried  it  in  a  tomb. 

And  the  apostles  gathered  themselves  together  unto  Jesus, 
and  told  him  all  that  they  had  done  and  taught.  And  he  said 
unto  them,  '  Come  ye  by  yourselves  into  a  lonely  place,  and  rest 
a  while.'  For  there  were  many  coming  and  going,  and  they  had 
no  leisure  so  much  as  to  eat.  And  they  went  away  by  boat  to 
a  lonely  place  by  themselves.  But  many  saw  them  departing, 
and  noticed  whither  they  were  going,  and  they  hurried  thither 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  13 

on  foot  from  all  the  cities,  and  arrived  before  them.  And  Jesus, 
when  he  disembarked,  saw  a  great  crowd,  and  he  was  moved  with 
compassion  toward  them,  because  they  were  as  sheep  without  a 
shepherd:   and  he  began  to  teach  them  many  things. 

And  when  the  day  was  now  far  spent,  his  disciples  came  unto 
him,  and  said,  'This  is  a  lonely  place,  and  the  hour  is  already 
late.  Send  the  people  away,  that  they  may  go  into  the  farms 
and  villages  round  about,  and  buy  themselves  something  to  eat.' 
But  he  answered  and  said  unto  them,  'Give  ye  them  to  eat.' 
And  they  said  unto  him,  'Shall  we  go  and  buy  two  hundred 
shillings  worth  of  bread,  and  give  them  to  eat  ? '  He  said  unto 
them, '  How  many  loaves  have  ye  ?  go  and  see.'  And  when  they 
had  found  out,  they  said,  '  Five,  and  two  fishes.'  And  he  bade 
them  make  them  all  sit  down  by  companies  upon  the  green  grass. 
And  they  sat  down  in  rows,  by  hundreds  and  by  fifties.  And  he 
took  the  five  loaves  and  the  two  fishes,  and  looked  up  to  heaven, 
and  said  the  blessing ;  and  he  broke  the  loaves,  and  gave  them 
to  his  disciples  to  set  before  them ;  and  the  two  fishes  he  divided 
among  them  all.  And  they  did  all  eat,  and  were  satisfied.  And 
they  took  of  the  broken  pieces  twelve  baskets  full,  and  also  of 
the  fishes.  And  they  that  ate  of  the  loaves  were  about  five 
thousand  men. 

And  straightway  he  made  his  disciples  get  into  the  boat,  and 
cross  over  to  the  other  side,  unto  Bethsaida,  while  he  dismissed 
the  people.  And  when  he  had  sent  them  away,  he  departed  unto 
the  mountain  to  pray.  And  when  evening  was  come,  the  boat 
was  in  the  middle  of  the  lake,  and  he  alone  on  the  land.  And  he 
saw  them  distressed  in  their  rowing ;  for  the  wind  was  against 
them:  and  about  the  fourth  watch  of  the  night  he  came  up  to 
them,  walking  upon  the  lake,  and  he  meant  to  have  passed  by 
them.  But  when  they  saw  him  walking  upon  the  lake,  they 
supposed  it  was  a  ghost,  and  cried  out :  for  they  all  saw  him,  and 
were  troubled.  But  he  immediately  spoke  to  them,  and  said, 
'Take  courage ;  it  is  I ;  be  not  afraid.'  And  he  went  up  to  them 
into  the  boat ;  and  the  wind  dropped.  Then  were  they  utterly 
beside  themselves  with  amazement,  for  they  had  not  understood 
about  the  loaves :  for  their  heart  was  hardened. 

And  when  they  had  crossed  over,  they  came  unto  Gennesaret, 


14  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

and  moored  the  boat  there.  And  when  they  got  out  of  the  boat, 
straightway  the  people  recognised  him.  And  they  ran  through 
that  whole  region,  and  began  to  bring  those  that  were  sick  on  beds 
to  wherever  they  heard  that  he  was.  And  whithersoever  he 
entered,  into  villages,  or  cities,  or  farmyards,  they  laid  the  sick  in 
the  open  places,  and  besought  him  that  they  might  touch  if  it 
were  but  the  border  of  his  garment :  and  as  many  as  touched  him 
were  healed. 

CHAPTER  VII 

And  the  Pharisees,  and  some  scribes  who  came  from  Jerusalem, 
gathered  round  him.  For  they  had  seen  some  of  his  disciples  eat 
bread  with  unclean,  that  is  to  say,  with  unwashed  hands.  For 
the  Pharisees,  and  all  the  Jews,  observing  the  tradition  of  the 
Elders,  do  not  eat  without  first  washing  their  hands.  And  when 
they  come  from  the  market,  till  they  have  washed,  they  eat  not. 
And  many  other  customs  there  are,  which  they  have  received  and 
observe,  such  as  the  washing  of  cups  and  pots  and  brazen  vessels. 
So  the  Pharisees  and  scribes  asked  him,  'Why  walk  not  thy 
disciples  according  to  the  tradition  of  the  elders,  but  eat  bread 
with  unclean  hands?'  He  said  unto  them,  'Well  did  Isaiah 
prophesy  of  you  hypocrites,  as  it  is  written,  This  people 
honoureth  me  with  their  lips,  but  their  heart  is  far  from  me.  And 
vainly  do  they  worship  me,  teaching  as  their  doctrines  the  com- 
mandments of  men.  So  ye,  neglecting  the  commandment  of 
God,  observe  the  tradition  of  men.' 

And  he  said  unto  them, '  Ye  do  well  to  reject  the  command- 
ment of  God,  in  order  that  ye  may  keep  your  tradition!  For 
Moses  said,  Honour  thy  father  and  thy  mother;  and,  Whoso 
revileth  father  or  mother,  let  him  die  the  death :  but  ye — if  a 
man  say  to  his  father  or  mother.  That  by  which  thou  mightest 
have  been  benefited  from  me  is  Corban, — (that  is,  an  offering), — 
ye  no  longer  permit  him  to  do  anything  for  his  father  or  his 
mother.  Thus  ye  make  the  word  of  God  void  through  your 
tradition,  which  ye  hand  down ;  and  many  such  like  things  ye  do.' 

And  he  called  all  the  people  again  unto  him,  and  he  said  unto 
them,  '  Hearken,  all  of  you,  unto  me,  and  understand :  There  ia 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  15 

nothing  outside  a  man,  which  entering  into  him  can  make  him 
unclean;  but  the  things  which  come  out  of  a  man,  these  are 
what  make  him  unclean.' 

And  when  he  had  entered  into  the  house  away  from  the  crowd, 
his  disciples  asked  him  concerning  the  saying.  And  he  said  unto 
them,  'Are  ye,  too,  so  unintelligent?  Do  ye  not  perceive  that 
whatever  entereth  into  a  man  from  without  cannot  make  him 
unclean  ?  For  it  entereth  not  into  his  heart,  but  into  the  belly, 
and  goeth  out  into  the  privy.'  [Thus  spake  he,  making  all  foods 
clean.]  And  he  said,  '  That  which  cometh  out  of  the  man,  that 
maketh  the  man  unclean.  For  from  within,  out  of  the  heart 
of  men,  come  the  evil  thoughts — unchastity,  thefts,  murders, 
adulteries,  covetousness,  wickedness,  deceit,  lasciviousness,  envy, 
blasphemy,  pride,  foolishness :  all  these  evil  things  come  out  from 
within,  and  they  make  a  man  unclean.' 

And  from  thence  he  arose,  and  went  into  the  district  of  Tyre. 
And  he  entered  into  an  house,  and  wished  that  none  should  know 
it:  but  he  could  not  escape  notice.  For,  straightway,  a  woman, 
whose  young  daughter  had  an  unclean  spirit,  and  who  had  heard 
of  him,  came  and  fell  at  his  feet:  (now  the  woman  was  a  heathen, 
a  Syrophoenician  by  race);  and  she  besought  him  that  he  would 
expel  the  demon  from  her  daughter.  But  Jesus  said  unto  her, 
'Let  the  children  first  be  filled:  for  it  is  not  meet  to  take  the 
children's  bread,  and  to  cast  it  unto  the  dogs.'  And  she  answered 
and  said  unto  him, '  Yes,  Lord :  yet  the  dogs  under  the  table  eat 
of  the  children's  crumbs.'  And  he  said  unto  her,  '  For  this  saying 
go  thy  way;  the  demon  has  gone  out  of  thy  daughter.'  And 
when  she  came  to  her  house,  she  found  her  daughter  lying  upon 
the  bed,  and  the  demon  had  departed. 

Then  he  left  the  district  of  Tyre,  and  came  by  way  of  Sidon 
unto  the  lake  of  Galilee,  through  the  midst  of  the  district  of  the 
Ten  Cities.  And  they  brought  unto  him  one  that  was  deaf  and 
stammered ;  and  they  besought  him  to  put  his  hand  upon  him. 
And  he  took  him  aside  from  the  crowd,  and  put  his  fingers  into 
his  ears,  and  touched  his  tongue  with  his  spittle,  and  looking  up 
to  heaven,  he  sighed,  and  said  unto  him,  'Ephphatha'  that  is,  'Be 
opened.'  And  straightway  his  ears  were  opened,  and  the  fetter 
of  his  tongue  was  loosed,  and  be  spoke  plainly.     And  he  enjoined 


1 6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

them  to  tell  no  one;  but  the  more  he  enjoined  them,  the  more 
did  they  proclaim  it.  And  they  were  exceedingly  astonished, 
saying, '  He  has  done  all  things  well :  he  makes  the  deaf  to  hear, 
and  the  dumb  to  speak.' 


CHAPTER  VIII 

In  those  days  there  was  again  a  great  crowd,  and  they  had 
nothing  to  eat.  And  Jesus  called  his  disciples  unto  him,  and 
said  unto  them, '  I  feel  pity  for  the  people  because  they  have  now 
tarried  with  me  three  days,  and  have  nothing  to  eat:  and  if  I 
send  them  away  fasting  to  their  own  homes,  they  will  faint  by 
the  way:  moreover  some  of  them  came  from  far.'  And  his 
disciples  answered  him,  '  Whence  can  one  satisfy  these  men  with 
bread  here  in  the  wilderness  ?'  And  he  asked  them, '  How  many 
loaves  have  ye?'  And  they  said,  'Seven.'  And  he  bade  the 
people  to  sit  down  on  the  ground :  and  he  took  the  seven  loaves, 
and  spoke  the  blessing,  and  broke  them,  and  gave  them  to  his 
disciples  to  set  before  the  people ;  and  they  did  so.  And  they 
had  a  few  small  fishes :  and  he  spoke  the  blessing,  and  told  them 
to  set  these  also  before  the  people.  So  they  did  eat,  and  were 
satisfied:  and  they  took  up  of  the  broken  bits  that  were  left, 
seven  baskets  full.  And  they  who  had  eaten  were  about  four 
thousand. 

And  when  he  had  sent  them  away,  straightway  he  entered 
into  a  boat  with  his  disciples,  and  came  into  the  district  of 
Dalmanutha.  And  the  Pharisees  came  forth,  and  began  to  dis- 
pute with  him,  demanding  from  him  a  sign  from  heaven,  in  order 
to  tempt  him.  And  he  sighed  deeply  in  his  spirit,  and  said, 
'  Wherefore  doth  this  generation  demand  a  sign  ?  verily  I  say 
unto  you,  There  shall  no  sign  be  given  unto  this  generation.' 

And  he  left  them,  and  entering  into  the  boat  again,  crossed 
over  to  the  other  side.  Now  they  had  forgotten  to  take  bread 
with  them,  and  they  had  not  in  the  boat  more  than  one  loaf. 
And  he  enjoined  them,  saying, '  Take  heed,  beware  of  the  leaven 
of  the  Pharisees,  and  of  the  leaven  of  Herod.'  And  they  argued 
with  one  another, '  We  have  no  bread.'    And  Jesus  perceived  it, 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  I? 

and  Baid  unto  them,  'Why  do  ye  argue  that  ye  have  no  bread? 
do  ye  not  yet  perceive  or  understand?  is  your  heart  hardened? 
Having  eyes,  see  ye  not  ?  and  having  ears,  hear  ye  not  ?  and  do 
ye  not  remember  ?  When  I  broke  the  five  loaves  among  the  five 
thousand,  how  many  baskets  full  of  fragments  took  ye  up  ? '  And 
they  said,  'Twelve.'  'And  when  the  seven  loaves  among  the  four 
thousand,  how  many  baskets  full  of  fragments  took  ye  up?' 
And  they  said, '  Seven.'  And  he  said  unto  them, '  Do  ye  still  not 
understand?' 

And  they  came  to  Bethsaida ;  and  they  brought  a  blind  man 
unto  him,  and  besought  him  to  touch  him.  And  he  took  the 
blind  man  by  the  hand,  and  led  him  out  of  the  village ;  and  he 
spat  into  his  eyes,  and  put  his  hands  upon  him,  and  asked  him  if 
he  saw  anything.  And  he  looked  up,  and  said,  '  I  perceive  men, 
for  I  see  them  like  trees,  walking.'  Then  Jesus  put  his  hands 
again  upon  his  eyes,  and  he  looked  steadfastly,  and  was  restored, 
and  saw  everything  clearly.  And  he  sent  him  away  to  his  house, 
saying, '  Go  not  into  the  village.' 

And  from  there  Jesus  went,  with  his  disciples,  into  the 
villages  of  Csesarea  Philippi :  and  on  the  way  he  asked  his 
disciples,  saying  unto  them,  '  Whom  do  men  say  that  I  am  ? ' 
And  they  answered,  '  John  the  Baptist ;  and  others,  Elijah ; 
and  others.  One  of  the  prophets.'  And  he  asked  them,  'But 
ye — whom  say  ye  that  I  am?'  And  Peter  answered  and  said 
unto  him,  'Thou  art  the  Messiah.'  And  he  sternly  admonished 
them  that  they  should  tell  no  man  of  him. 

And  he  began  to  teach  them  that  the  Son  of  man  must 
suffer  much,  and  be  rejected  by  the  Elders  and  the  chief  priests 
and  the  scribes,  and  be  killed,  and  after  three  days  rise  again. 
And  he  spoke  the  word  quite  openly. 

And  Peter  took  him  aside,  and  began  to  rebuke  him.  But 
he  turned  round,  and  looking  on  his  disciples,  he  rebuked  Peter, 
saying,  'Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan:  for  thou  thinkest  not  the 
thoughts  of  God,  but  of  men.'  And  he  called  the  people  unto 
him  together  with  his  disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  'Whoever 
would  follow  after  rae,  let  him  deny  himself,  and  take  up  his 
cross,  and  follow  me.  For  whoever  would  save  his  life  shall 
lose  it;   but  whoever  would  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  and  the 


1 8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

gospel's,  he  shall  save  it.  For  what  can  it  profit  a  man  to 
gain  the  whole  world,  and  to  forfeit  his  life  ?  For  what  can 
a  man  give  as  the  price  of  his  life  ?  For  whoever  shall  be 
ashamed  of  me  and  of  my  words  in  this  adulterous  and  sinful 
generation,  of  him  also  shall  the  Son  of  man  be  ashamed,  when  he 
Cometh  in  the  glory  of  his  Father  with  the  holy  angels.'  And  he 
said  unto  them,  'Verily  I  say  unto  you,  There  are  some  of  those 
■who  stand  here  who  shall  not  taste  death  till  they  see  the 
kingdom  of  God  come  with  power.' 


CHAPTER  IX 

And  after  six  days  Jesus  took  with  him  Peter  and  James 
and  John,  and  led  them  up  on  to  an  high  mountain,  apart  by 
themselves.  And  he  was  transfigured  before  them,  and  his 
raiment  became  shining,  exceeding  white,  so  as  no  fuller  on  earth 
could  whiten  it.  And  there  appeared  unto  them  Elijah  with 
Moses :  and  they  talked  with  Jesus.  And  Peter  said  to  Jesus, 
"Master,  it  is  good  for  us  to  be  here:  let  us  make  three  tents; 
one  for  thee,  and  one  for  Moses,  and  one  for  Elijah.'  For  he 
knew  not  what  he  should  say ;  for  they  were  sore  afraid.  And  a 
cloud  arose  and  overshadowed  them :  and  a  voice  came  out  of  the 
cloud,  saying,  '  This  is  my  beloved  Son :  hearken  unto  him.' 
And  suddenly,  when  they  looked  round,  they  saw  no  one  any 
more,  except  Jesus  only  with  themselves. 

And  as  they  came  down  from  the  mountain,  he  commanded 
them  that  they  should  tell  no  man  what  they  had  seen,  till  the 
Son  of  man  had  risen  from  the  dead. 

And  they  kept  the  command,  but  among  themselves  they 
disputed  what  'rising  from  the  dead'  might  mean.  And  they 
asked  him,  saying,  'How  is  it,  then,  that  the  scribes  say  that 
Elijah  must  come  first?'  And  he  answered  and  told  them, 
'  Elijah  verily  cometh  first,  and  putteth  all  things  in  order ;  yet 
how  then  is  it  written  of  the  Son  of  man,  that  he  must  suffer 
much  and  be  despised  ?  But  I  say  unto  you  that  Elijah  hath 
come  already,  and  they  have  done  unto  him  whatsoever  they 
wished,  as  it  is  written  of  him." 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  I9 

And  when  they  came  to  the  disciples,  they  saw  a  great 
crowd  around  them,  and  some  scribes  disputing  with  them. 
And  straightway  all  the  crowd,  when  they  beheld  him,  were 
greatly  amazed,  and  running  to  him,  welcomed  him.  And  he 
asked  them,  '  What  are  ye  disputing  with  one  another  ?'  And 
one  of  the  crowd  answered  and  said, '  Master,  I  brought  unto  thee 
my  son,  who  is  possessed  by  a  dumb  spirit ;  and  wherever  the 
spirit  seizes  him,  it  tears  him:  and  he  foams,  and  gnashes  his 
teeth,  and  wastes  away  :  and  I  asked  thy  disciples  to  cast  it  out, 
but  they  could  not.'  Then  Jesus  answered  and  said  to  them, 
'  O  unbelieving  generation,  how  long  shall  I  be  with  you  ?  how 
long  shall  I  bear  with  you  ?  bring  him  unto  me.'  And  they 
brought  him  unto  him :  and  when  he  saw  Jesus,  straightway 
the  spirit  convulsed  him ;  and  he  fell  on  the  ground,  and  rolled 
about,  foaming.  And  Jesus  asked  his  father, '  How  long  ago  is  it 
since  this  has  happened  to  him  ?'  And  he  said,  'From  childhood. 
And  ofttimes  it  has  thrown  him  into  the  fire,  and  into  the 
water,  to  destroy  him :  but  if  thou  canst  do  anything,  have 
compassion  on  us,  and  help  us.'  Jesus  said  unto  him,  '  If  thou 
canst,  sayest  thou?  All  things  are  possible  to  him  that  believeth.' 
And  straightway  the  father  of  the  child  cried  out,  and  said,  'I 
believe;  help  thou  mine  unbelief  When  Jesus  saw  that  more 
people  kept  running  up  to  him,  he  rebuked  the  unclean  spirit, 
saying  unto  it,  'Thou  dumb  and  deaf  spirit,  I  command  thee, 
come  out  of  him,  and  enter  no  more  into  him.'  And  the  spirit 
shrieked,  and  rent  him  sore,  and  came  out  of  him :  and  he  was  as 
one  dead;  insomuch  that  many  said,  'He  is  dead.'  But  Jesus 
took  him  by  the  hand,  and  lifted  him  up ;   and  he  arose. 

And  when  Jesus  had  gone  into  the  house,  his  disciples  asked 
him  privately,  '  Why  could  not  we  cast  it  out  ? '  And  he  said 
unto  them,  'This  kind  goes  not  out  except  by  prayer  [and 
fasting].'  And  they  departed  thence,  and  passed  through  Galilee ; 
and  he  desired  that  none  should  know  it.  For  he  taught  his 
disciples,  and  said  unto  them, '  The  Son  of  man  will  be  delivered 
into  the  hands  of  men,  and  they  will  kill  him ;  and  after  he  has 
been  killed,  he  will  rise  after  three  days.'  But  they  understood 
not  the  saying,  and  were  afraid  to  ask  him. 

And   they  came  to   Capernaum :   and  when  he  was   in  the 


20  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

house,  he  asked  them,  '  What  did  ye  discuss  among  yourselves  on 
the  way?'  But  they  held  their  peace:  for  on  the  way  they  had 
argued  among  themselves  who  was  the  greatest.  And  he  sat 
down,  and  called  the  Twelve,  and  said  unto  them,  '  If  any  man 
desire  to  be  first,  let  him  be  last  of  all,  and  servant  of  all.'  And 
he  took  a  child,  and  set  him  in  the  midst  of  them  :  and  he  embraced 
him,  and  said  unto  them,  'Whoever  shall  receive  one  of  these 
children  in  my  name,  receiveth  me :  and  whoever  receiveth  me, 
receiveth  not  me,  but  Him  that  sent  me.' 

And  John  said  to  him,  'Master,  we  saw  one  casting  out 
demons  in  thy  name,  and  he  does  not  follow  us :  and  we  sought 
to  prevent  him,  because  he  did  not  follow  us.'  But  Jesus  said, 
'  Prevent  him  not :  for  no  man  who  doeth  a  miracle  in  my  name, 
will  readily  speak  evil  of  me.  For  he  that  is  not  against  us  is 
for  us.  For  whoever  shall  give  you  a  cup  of  water  to  drink  in 
my  name,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ,  verily  I  say  unto  you,  he 
shall  not  lose  his  reward.  And  whoever  shall  cause  one  of  these 
little  ones  that  believe  to  stumble,  it  were  better  for  him  that  a 
millstone  were  hanged  about  his  neck,  and  he  were  cast  into  the 
sea.  And  if  thy  hand  cause  thee  to  stumble,  cut  it  off:  it  is 
better  for  thee  to  enter  into  Life  maimed,  than  having  two  hands 
to  go  into  hell,  into  the  fire  that  shall  never  be  quenched.  And 
if  thy  foot  cause  thee  to  stumble,  cut  it  off:  it  is  better  for  thee 
to  enter  lame  into  Life,  than  having  two  feet  to  be  cast  into  hell. 
And  if  thine  eye  cause  thee  to  stumble,  pluck  it  out :  it  is  better 
for  thee  to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God  with  one  eye,  than 
having  two  eyes  to  be  cast  into  hell :  where  their  worm  dieth  not, 
and  the  fire  is  not  quenched.  For  every  one  shall  be  salted  with 
fire.  Salt  is  good  :  but  if  the  salt  have  lost  its  saltuess,  wherewith 
will  ye  season  it  ?  Have  salt  in  yourselves,  and  keep  peace  with 
one  another.' 

CHAPTER  X 

And  he  arose  from  thence,  and  came  into  the  district  of  Judaea 
beyond  the  Jordan :  and  crowds  collected  unto  him  again ;  and  he 
taught  them  again,  as  he  was  wont. 

And  the  Phaiisees  came  and  asked  him,  in  order  to  test  him : 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  21 

'  May  a  man  divorce  his  wife  ?'  And  he  answered  and  said  unto 
them,  'What  did  Moses  command  you?'  And  they  said,  'Moses 
permitted  him  to  write  a  bill  of  divorce,  and  to  send  her  away.' 
And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  To  suit  the  hardness  of  your  hearts 
he  wrote  you  this  precept.  But  from  the  beginning  of  the  creation : 
He  made  them  male  and  female :  therefore  shall  a  man  leave  his 
father  and  mother,  and  cleave  to  his  wife ;  and  they  two  shall  be 
one  flesh:  so  then  they  are  no  more  two,  but  one  flesh.  What 
therefore  God  hath  joined  together,  let  not  man  separate.' 

And  in  the  house  his  disciples  asked  him  again  about  this 
matter.  And  he  said  unto  them,  '  Whoever  divorces  his  wife,  and 
marries  another,  commits  adultery  against  her.  And  if  a  woman 
divorce  her  husband,  and  marry  another,  she  commits  adultery.' 

And  they  brought  young  children  to  him,  for  him  to  touch 
them :  and  his  disciples  rebuked  those  that  brought  them.  But 
when  Jesus  saw  it,  he  was  indignant,  and  he  said  unto  them,  '  Let 
the  little  children  come  unto  me,  and  prevent  them  not :  for  of 
such  is  the  kingdom  of  God.  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  Whoever 
shall  not  receive  the  kingdom  of  God  as  a  little  child,  he  shall 
surely  not  enter  therein.'  And  he  embraced  them  and  blessed 
them,  putting  his  hands  upon  them. 

And  as  he  set  forth  upon  his  way,  one  ran  up,  and  knelt 
and  asked  him, '  Good  Master,  what  shall  I  do  that  I  may  inherit 
eternal  life?'  And  Jesus  said  unto  him,  'Why  callest  thou  me 
good  ?  no  one  is  good  except  God  alone.  Thou  knowest  the  com- 
mandments. Do  not  commit  adultery.  Do  no  murder.  Do  not  steal. 
Do  not  bear  false  witness,  Defraud  not,  Honour  thy  father  and 
mother.'  And  he  said  unto  him,  '  Master,  all  these  have  I 
observed  from  my  youth.'  Then  Jesus  looked  at  him,  and  felt 
love  for  him,  and  said  unto  him,  'One  thing  thou  lackest :  go  thy 
way,  sell  whatsoever  thou  hast,  and  give  it  to  the  poor,  and  thou 
shalt  have  treasure  in  heaven :  and  come,  follow  me.'  But  he  was 
sad  at  that  saying,  and  went  away  grieved:   for  he  had  great 


And  Jesus  looked  round  about,  and  said  unto  his  disciples, 
'How  difiScult  is  it  for  them  who  have  riches  to  enter  the  kingdom 
of  God  1  It  is  easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a 
needle  than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  the  kingdom  of  God.'     And 


22  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

the  disciples  were  astonished  at  his  words.  But  Jesus  spoke  again 
and  said  unto  them,  'Children,  how  difficult  it  is  to  enter  into  the 
kingdom  of  God!'  And  they  were  appalled  beyond  measure, 
saying  among  themselves,  '  Who  then  can  be  saved  V  But  Jesus, 
looking  at  them,  said,  '  For  men  it  is  impossible,  but  not  for  God  : 
since  for  God  all  things  are  possible.' 

Then  Peter  began  to  say  unto  him,  'Lo,  we  have  abandoned  all, 
and  have  followed  thee.'  And  Jesus  answered  and  said,  'Verily  I 
say  unto  you,  there  is  no  man  who  hath  abandoned  house,  or 
brethren,  or  sisters,  or  father,  or  mother,  or  children,  or  lands,  for 
my  sake,  and  the  gospel's,  who  shall  not  receive  back  an  hundred- 
fold :  now  in  this  age,  houses,  and  brethren,  and  sisters,  and 
mothers,  and  children,  and  lands,  though  with  persecutions ;  and 
in  the  world  to  come  eternal  life.  But  many  that  are  now  first 
shall  be  last;  and  the  last  first.' 

And  they  were  on  the  way  going  up  to  Jerusalem ;  and  Jesus 
went  on  in  front  of  them ;  and  they  were  amazed ;  and  they  that 
followed  were  afraid.  And  again  he  took  the  Twelve  aside,  and 
began  to  tell  them  what  would  happen  unto  him.  'Behold,  we  go 
up  to  Jerusalem ;  and  the  Son  of  man  will  be  given  up  unto  the 
chief  priests  and  unto  the  scribes ;  and  they  will  condemn  him  to 
death,  and  will  give  him  up  to  the  heathen.  And  they  will  mock 
him,  and  spit  upon  him,  and  scourge  him,  and  kill  him :  and  after 
three  days  he  will  rise  again.' 

And  James  and  John,  the  sons  of  Zebedee,  came  unto  him, 
saying, '  Master,  we  wish  that  thou  wouldst  do  for  us  whatever  we 
ask  thee.'  And  he  said  unto  them,  'What  do  ye  wish  that  I 
should  do  for  you  ?'  They  said  unto  him, '  Grant  unto  us  that  we 
may  sit,  one  on  thy  right  hand,  and  the  other  on  thy  left  hand,  in 
thy  glory.'  But  Jesus  said  unto  them,  'Ye  know  not  what  ye  ask: 
can  ye  drink  of  the  cup  that  I  am  to  drink  of  ?  and  be  baptized 
with  the  baptism  that  I  am  to  be  baptized  with  ?'  And  they  said 
unto  him,  'We  can.'  And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  Ye  shall  indeed 
drink  of  the  cup  that  I  am  to  drink  of:  and  with  the  baptism 
that  I  am  to  be  baptized  with  shall  ye  be  baptized  :  but  to  sit  on 
my  right  hand  and  on  my  left  hand  is  not  mine  to  give ;  but  it 
shall  be  for  them  for  whom  it  is  destined.' 

And  when  the  ten  heard  it,  they  began  to  be  indignant  with 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  23 

James  and  John*  But  Jesus  called  them  to  him,  and  said  unto 
them,  'Ye  know  that  they  who  are  supposed  to  rule  over  the 
nations  lord  it  over  them ;  and  their  great  ones  play  the  tyrant 
over  them.  But  it  is  not  so  among  you :  but  whoever  wisheth  to 
become  great  among  you,  let  him  be  your  servant ;  and  whoever 
of  you  would  be  the  first,  let  him  be  the  slave  of  all.  For  the 
Son  of  man  came  not  to  be  served,  but  to  serve,  and  to  give  his 
life  as  a  ransom  for  many.' 

And  they  came  to  Jericho:  and  as  he  went  out  of  Jericho 
with  his  disciples  and  a  large  crowd,  a  blind  beggar,  Bartimaeus. 
the  son  of  Timseus,  sat  by  the  way  side.  And  when  he  heard 
that  it  was  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  he  began  to  cry  out,  and  say,, 
'  Jesus,  son  of  David,  pity  me.'  And  many  rebuked  him  that  he: 
should  hold  his  peace :  but  he  kept  on  crying  all  the  louder,  '  Soi> 
of  David,  pity  me.'  And  Jesus  stood  still,  and  said :  '  Call  him.'' 
And  they  called  the  blind  man,  saying  unto  him,  'Be  of  good 
cheer,  rise ;  he  calls  thee.'  And  he,  casting  away  his  cloak,  sprang 
up  and  came  to  Jesus.  And  Jesus  answered  and  said  unto  him, 
'What  wouldst  thou  that  I  should  do  unto  thee?'  The  blind 
man  said  unto  him,  'Master,  I  would  that  I  might  see  again.' 
And  Jesus  said  unto  him,  '  Go  thy  way ;  thy  faith  has  healed 
thee.'  And  immediately  he  received  his  sight  again,  and  followed 
Jesus  on  the  way. 

CHAPTER  XI 

And  when  they  came  nigh  to  Jerusalem,  unto  Bethphage 
and  Bethany,  at  the  mount  of  Olives,  he  sent  forth  two  of  his 
disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Go  to  the  village  before  you :  and 
immediately  as  ye  enter  it,  ye  will  find  an  ass's  colt  tied,  whereon 
no  man  has  yet  sat ;  loose  it  and  bring  it  here.  And  if  any  man 
say  unto  you.  Why  do  ye  this  ?  say  ye.  The  Lord  has  need  of  it, 
and  he  will  send  it  back  again  here  very  soon.'  And  they 
departed,  and  found  the  colt  tied  by  the  gate  outside  in  the  open 
place ;  and  they  loosed  it.  And  some  men  who  stood  there  said 
unto  them, '  What  do  ye,  loosing  the  colt  ?'  And  they  said  unto 
them  even  as  Jesus  had  commanded:  and  they  permitted  them 
to  take  it.     And  they  brought  the  colt  to  Jesus,  and  laid  their 


24  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

cloaks  upon  it;  and  he  sat  upon  it.  And  many  spread  their  cloaks 
upon  the  way:  and  others  strewed  plants  which  they  cut  from 
the  fields.  And  they  that  went  before,  and  they  that  followed, 
kept  crying :  '  Hosanna ;  blessed  be  he  that  cometh  in  the  name 
of  the  Lord :  blessed  be  the  kingdom  of  our  father  David  that  is 
coming ;  Hosanna  in  the  heights.' 

And  Jesus  entered  into  Jerusalem,  and  into  the  temple :  and 
when  he  had  looked  round  at  everything  there,  as  the  hour  was 
late,  he  went  out  unto  Bethany  with  the  Twelve. 

And  on  the  morrow,  when  they  left  Bethany,  he  was  hungry : 
and  seeing  a  fig  tree  afar  off  having  leaves,  he  went  up  to  it  to 
see  if  he  should  find  anything  on  it :  and  when  he  came  to  it,  he 
found  nothing  but  leaves ;  for  it  was  not  the  season  for  figs.  And 
Jesus  spoke  and  said  unto  the  tree :  '  Let  no  man  eat  firuit  of  thee 
again  for  ever.'     And  his  disciples  heard  it. 

And  they  came  to  Jerusalem :  and  Jesus  went  into  the  temple, 
and  began  to  drive  out  them  that  sold  and  bought  in  the  temple, 
and  he  overthrew  the  tables  of  the  money-changers,  and  the  seats 
of  them  that  sold  doves ;  and  he  would  not  allow  anyone  to  carry 
a  vessel  through  the  temple. 

And  he  taught,  saying  unto  them,  'Is  it  not  written.  My  house 
shall  be  called  a  house  of  prayer  for  all  nations  ?  but  ye  have 
made  it  a  den  of  thieves.'  And  the  chief  priests  and  the  scribes 
heard  it,  and  sought  how  they  might  destroy  him :  for  they  feared 
him,  because  all  the  people  were  amazed  at  his  teaching.  And 
when  evening  was  come,  he  went  out  of  the  city. 

And  in  the  morning,  as  they  passed  by,  they  saw  the  fig  tree 
dried  up  from  the  roots.  And  Peter  remembered,  and  said  unto 
him,  'Master,  behold,  the  fig  tree  which  thou  cursedst  is  dried  up.' 
And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  them, '  Have  faith  in  God.  For 
verily  I  say  unto  you,  that  whoever  should  say  unto  this  mountain, 
Lift  thyself  up,  and  hurl  thyself  into  the  sea;  and  did  not  doubt 
in  his  heart,  but  believed  that  his  word  would  come  to  pass :  to 
him  it  would  come  to  pass.  Therefore  I  say  unto  you,  What 
things  soever  ye  pray  for  and  ask,  believe  that  ye  have  received 
them,  and  they  will  be  yours.  And  when  ye  stand  and  pray,  if  ye 
have  aught  against  any  one,  forgive  him,  that  your  Father  who  is 
in  heaven  may  also  forgive  you  your  trespasses.' 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  25 

And  they  came  again  to  Jerusalem  :  and  as  he  was  walking  in 
the  temple,  the  chief  priests,  and  the  scribes,  and  the  elders  came 
up  to  him  and  said :  '  By  what  authority  doest  thou  these  things  ? 
and  who  gave  thee  this  authority  to  do  these  things  ?'  And  Jesus 
answered  and  said  unto  them,  'I  will  also  ask  of  you  one  question; 
do  ye  answer  me,  and  I  will  tell  you  by  what  authority  I  do  these 
things.  The  baptism  of  John,  was  it  from  heaven,  or  from  men  ? 
answer  me.'  And  they  deliberated  among  themselves,  saying, '  If 
we  say,  From  heaven ;  he  will  say,  Why  then  did  ye  not  believe 
him  ?  Or  shall  we  say.  From  men  ? '  But  they  feared  the  people : 
for  all  held  John  to  be  really  a  prophet.  So  they  answered  and 
said  unto  Jesus, '  We  do  not  know.'  And  Jesus  said  unto  them. 
'  Neither  do  I  tell  you  by  what  authority  I  do  these  things.' 


CHAPTER  XII 

And  he  began  to  speak  unto  them  in  parables.  'A  man 
planted  a  vineyard,  and  set  an  hedge  around  it,  and  dug  out  a 
wine  press,  and  built  a  tower.  And  he  let  it  to  husbandmen,  and 
went  abroad.  And  at  the  proper  time  he  sent  to  the  husbandmen 
a  servant,  that  he  might  receive  from  the  husbandmen  his  share 
of  the  fruit  of  the  vineyard.  And  they  seized  him,  and  beat  him, 
and  sent  him  away  empty.  And  again  he  sent  unto  them  another 
servant ;  and  him  they  wounded  and  reviled.  And  again  he  sent 
another;  and  him  they  killed.  And  he  sent  many  others;  and 
some  they  beat,  and  some  they  killed.  But  he  had  still  an  only 
and  well-beloved  son :  him  he  sent  last  unto  them,  saying,  They 
will  have  respect  for  my  son.  But  those  husbandmen  said  among 
themselves,  This  is  the  heir;  come,  let  us  kill  him,  and  the 
inheritance  will  be  ours.  So  they  seized  him,  and  killed  him,  and 
cast  him  out  of  the  vineyard.  What  will  the  lord  of  the  vineyard 
do  ?  he  will  come  and  destroy  the  husbandmen,  and  will  give  the 
vineyard  unto  others. 

'And  have  ye  not  read  this  passage  in  the  scripture:  The 
stone  which  the  builders  rejected  is  become  the  comer-stone. 
This  is  the  Lord's  doing,  and  it  is  marvellous  in  our  eyes?' 

And  they  sought  to  take  him  prisoner,  for  they  realized  that 


26  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

he  had  spoken  the  parable  against  them :   but  they  feared  the 
people,  so  they  left  him,  and  went  their  way. 

And  they  sent  unto  him  certain  of  the  Pharisees  and  of  the 
Herodians,  that  they  might  entrap  him  by  his  words.  And  when 
they  were  come,  they  said  unto  him,  '  Master,  we  know  that  thou 
art  truthful,  and  hast  regard  for  no  man :  for  thou  respectest  not 
the  person  of  men,  but  teachest  the  way  of  God  in  truth.  Is  it 
lawful  to  give  tribute  to  the  Emperor,  or  not  ?  Should  we  give 
it,  or  should  we  not  give  it  V  But  he,  perceiving  their  deceitful- 
ness,  said  unto  them,  '  Why  tempt  ye  me  ?  bring  me  a  silver  coin, 
that  I  may  see  it.'  And  they  brought  it.  And  he  said  unto  them, 
'  Whose  is  this  image  and  superscription  ? '  And  they  said  unto 
him,  'The  Emperor's.'  And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  them, 
'  Pay  to  the  Emperor  what  is  the  Emperor's,  and  to  God  what  is 
God's.'    And  they  marvelled  at  him  greatly. 

John  vii.  53-viii.  11 
And  they  went,  each  one,  to  his  own  house.  And  Jesus  went 
to  the  Mount  of  Olives.  And  early  in  the  morning,  he  returned 
to  the  temple,  and  all  the  people  came  unto  him,  and  he  sat  down, 
and  he  taught  them.  And  the  scribes  and  Pharisees  brought 
unto  him  a  woman  taken  in  adultery,  and  putting  her  in  the 
midst  of  them,  they  said  to  him,  '  Master,  this  woman  was  taken 
in  the  very  act  of  adultery.  Now  Moses  commanded  us  in  the 
Law  that  such  women  should  be  stoned;  what  then  sayest  thou?' 
And  they  said  this  to  try  him,  that  they  might  have  something 
with  which  to  accuse  him.  But  Jesus  stooped  forward  and  wrote 
with  his  finger  upon  the  ground.  But  when  they  continued 
asking  him,  he  raised  his  head,  and  said  unto  them, '  He  that  is 
without  sin  amongst  you,  let  him  be  the  first  to  cast  a  stone  at 
her.'  And  again  he  stooped  forward,  and  wrote  upon  the  ground. 
And  they,  having  heard  that,  withdrew  one  by  one,  beginning  with 
the  eldest ;  and  Jesus  was  left  alone,  and  the  woman,  where  she 
was,  in  the  midst.  And  Jesus  lifted  his  head,  and  said  to  her: 
'  Woman,  where  are  they  ?  Has  no  one  condemned  thee  V  And 
she  said, '  No  one,  Lord.'  Then  Jesus  said,  'Neither  do  I  condemn 
the6.     Go,  and  from  henceforth  sin  no  more.' 

Then  came  unto  him  some  Sadducees,  who  say  there  is  no 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  27 

resurrection ;  and  they  asked  him,  saying,  '  Master,  Moses  wrote 
for  us.  If  a  man  die,  and  leave  a  wife  and  no  child,  his  brother 
must  marry  his  wife,  and  raise  up  seed  unto  his  brother.  Now 
there  were  seven  brothers :  and  the  first  took  a  wife,  and  dying 
left  no  seed.  And  the  second  married  her,  and  died  without  leaving 
seed :  and  the  third  likewise.  And  all  seven  left  no  seed :  last 
of  all  the  woman  died  also.  In  the  resurrection,  therefore,  when 
they  rise,  whose  wife  will  she  be  of  them  ?  for  all  the  seven  had 
her  to  wife.' 

And  Jesus  answering  said  unto  them,  'Does  not  this  prove 
that  ye  err,  and  that  ye  neither  know  the  scriptures  nor  the 
power  of  God  ?  For  when  they  rise  from  the  dead,  they  neither 
marry  nor  are  given  in  marriage ;  but  are  as  the  angels  in  heaven. 
But  as  regards  the  dead,  that  they  rise :  have  ye  not  read  in  the 
book  of  Moses,  in  the  story  of  the  burning  bush,  how  God  spoke 
unto  him,  saying,  I  am  the  God  of  Abraham,  and  the  God  of  Isaac, 
and  the  God  of  Jacob  ?  He  is  not  the  God  of  the  dead,  but  the 
God  of  the  living :  ye  do  greatly  err.' 

Then  one  of  the  scribes  who  had  heard  them  disputing  together, 
and  had  perceived  that  Jesus  had  answered  them  excellently,  came 
up  and  asked  him,  'Which  commandment  is  the  first  of  all?'  And 
Jesus  answered  him, '  The  first  of  all  the  commandments  is,  Hear, 
0  Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  the  Lord  is  One :  and  thou  shalt  love 
the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy  heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and 
with  all  thy  mind,  and  with  all  thy  strength.  And  the  second  is 
this,  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself.  There  is  no  other 
commandment  greater  than  these.'  And  the  scribe  said  unto  him, 
'Excellently,  Master,  thou  hast  said  the  truth,  that  He  is  One,  and 
there  is  none  other  but  He :  and  to  love  Him  with  all  one's  heart, 
and  with  all  one's  understanding,  and  with  all  one's  strength,  and 
to  love  one's  neighbour  as  oneself,  is  much  better  than  all  burnt 
offerings  and  sacrifices.'  And  when  Jesus  saw  that  he  answered 
intelligently,  he  said  unto  him,  'Thou  art  not  far  from  the  kingdom 
of  God.' 

And  no  man  ventured  to  ask  him  any  more  questions.  And 
Jesus  went  on  teaching  in  the  temple,  and  said :  '  How  can  the 
scribes  say  that  the  Messiah  is  the  son  of  David  ?  For  David 
himself  said  in  the  Holy  Spirit,  The  Lord  said  to  my  lord,  Sit  thou 


28  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

on  my  right  hand,  till  I  make  thine  enemies  thy  footstool.  David 
himself  calleth  him  lord;  how  is  he  then  his  son?'  And  the 
mass  of  the  people  heard  him  gladly. 

And  he  said  unto  them  in  his  teaching,  'Beware  of  the  scribes, 
who  love  to  walk  in  long  robes,  and  to  be  saluted  in  the  market- 
places, and  to  have  the  first  seats  in  the  synagogues  and  at  feasts: 
who  devour  widows'  houses,  and  for  a  pretence  make  long  prayers: 
these  shall  receive  all  the  heavier  punishment.' 

And  Jesns  sat  down  opposite  the  treasury,  and  watched  the 
people  throwing  money  into  the  treasury:  and  many  that  were 
rich  cast  in  much.  And  a  poor  widow  came  and  threw  in  two 
farthings,  which  make  a  halfpenny.  And  he  called  unto  him  his 
disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  'Verily  I  say  unto  you,  this  poor 
widow  has  thrown  in  more  than  all  who  have  thrown  into  the 
treasury :  for  all  they  threw  in  from  their  superfluity ;  but  she 
from  her  poverty  has  thrown  in  all  that  she  possessed,  even  all 
her  living.' 

CHAPTER  XIII 

And  as  he  went  out  of  the  temple,  one  of  his  disciples  said 
unto  him,  'Master,  see,  what  grand  stones  and  what  grand 
buildings!'  And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  him,  'Seest  thou 
these  great  buildings  ?  There  shall  not  be  left  one  stone  upon 
another,  which  shall  not  be  thrown  down.' 

And  as  he  sat  upon  the  mount  of  Olives  over  against  the 
temple,  Peter  and  James  and  John  and  Andrew  asked  him 
privately,  '  Tell  us,  when  shall  these  things  be  ?  and  what  is  the 
sign  when  all  these  things  are  to  be  fulfilled  ?' 

And  Jesus,  answering  them,  began  to  say, '  Take  heed  lest  any 
man  lead  you  astray :  for  many  will  come  in  my  name,  saying,  It 
is  I,  and  they  shall  lead  many  astray.  And  when  ye  hear  of  wars 
and  rumours  of  wars,  be  ye  not  alarmed ;  for  these  things  must 
happen;  but  the  End  is  not  yet.  For  nation  will  rise  against 
nation,  and  kingdom  against  kingdom :  and  there  will  be  earth- 
quakes in  divers  places,  and  there  will  be  famines :  these  are  the 
beginnings  of  the  Pangs. 

'  But  ye — take  heed  to  youi-selves :  for  they  will  deliver  you 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  29 

Mp  to  law  courts;  and  in  synagogues  ye  will  be  beaten:  and  ye 
will  be  brought  before  rulers  and  kings  for  my  sake,  to  bear 
iffitness  before  them.  For  the  gospel  must  first  be  proclaimed 
unto  all  nations.  But  when  they  take  you  away,  and  deliver  you 
up,  have  no  care  beforehand  what  ye  shall  speak,  but  whatsoever 
shall  be  given  you  in  that  hour,  that  speak  ye :  for  it  is  not  ye 
that  speak,  but  the  Holy  Spirit.  And  brother  will  deliver  up 
brother  to  death,  and  the  father  his  son ;  and  children  will  rise  up 
against  their  parents,  and  will  put  them  to  death.  And  ye  will 
be  hated  of  all  men  for  my  name's  sake:  but  he  that  endureth 
unto  the  end,  he  shall  be  saved. 

'  But  when  ye  shall  see  the  Abomination  of  Desolation,  stand- 
ing where  it  ought  not  (let  him  that  readeth  give  heed),  then  let 
them  that  be  in  Judaea  flee  to  the  mountains :  and  let  him  that 
is  on  the  roof  not  go  down  into  the  house,  neither  enter  therein, 
to  take  anything  out  of  his  house:  and  let  him  that  is  in  the 
field  not  go  back  to  fetch  his  cloak.  But  woe  to  them  that  are 
with  child,  and  to  them  that  give  suck  in  those  days !  And  pray 
ye  that  it  may  not  be  in  the  winter.  For  in  those  days  there 
will  be  affliction,  such  as  hath  not  been  from  the  beginning  of  the 
world  which  God  created  until  now,  and  will  not  be  again.  And 
if  the  Lord  had  not  shortened  those  days,  no  flesh  would  be 
saved :  but  for  the  elect's  sake,  whom  he  hath  chosen  out,  he  hath 
shortened  the  days.  And  then  if  any  man  shall  say  to  you,  Lo, 
here  is  the  Messiah ;  or,  lo,  he  is  there ;  believe  him  not.  For 
false  Messiahs  and  false  prophets  will  arise,  and  will  perform 
signs  and  wonders,  to  cause  the  elect,  if  it  be  possible,  to  go 
astray.  But  take  ye  heed:  behold,  I  have  foretold  everything 
unto  you. 

'But  in  those  days,  after  that  affliction,  the  sun  will  be 
darkened,  and  the  moon  will  not  give  her  light,  and  the  stars 
will  fall  from  heaven,  and  the  heavenly  powers  will  be  shaken. 
And  then  will  be  seen  the  Son  of  man  coming  on  the  clouds  with 
great  power  and  glory.  And  then  he  will  send  out  the  angels,  and 
will  gather  together  his  elect  from  the  four  winds,  from  the  utter- 
most part  of  the  earth  to  the  uttermost  part  of  heaven. 

'  From  the  fig  tree  learn  a  parable :  when  its  branch  becometh 
soft,  and  it  putteth  forth  leaves,  ye  know  that  summer  is  near ;  so. 


30  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

too,  ye,  when  ye  see  these  things  happening,  know  that  he  is  nigh, 
even  at  the  door. 

'Verily  I  say  unto  you,  that  this  generation  shall  not  pass 
away,  till  all  these  things  shall  have  taken  place.  Heaven  and 
earth  shall  pass  away :  but  my  words  shall  not  pass  away.  But  as 
to  that  day  and  as  to  the  hour,  no  man  knoweth,  not  even  the 
angels  who  are  in  heaven,  and  not  even  the  Son,  but  only  the 
Father. 

'  Take  ye  heed,  watch  :  for  ye  know  not  when  the  time  is.  For 
it  is  as  if  a  man  went  abroad,  and  left  his  house,  and  gave  authority 
to  his  servants,  and  to  every  man  his  work,  and  commanded  ithe 
porter  to  watch.  Watch  ye  therefore  :  for  ye  know  not  when  the 
master  of  the  house  cometh,  whether  at  even,  or  at  midnight,  or 
at  the  cockcrowing,  or  in  the  early  morning :  lest  coming  suddenly, 
he  find  you  sleeping.  And  what  I  say  unto  you,  I  say  unto  all: 
Watch.' 

CHAPTER  XIV 

Now  it  was  two  days  before  the  feast  of  the  passover  and  of 
the  unleavened  bread  :  and  the  chief  priests  and  the  scribes  sought 
how  they  might  capture  him  by  craft,  and  put  him  to  death.  For 
they  said, '  Not  on  the  festival,  lest  there  be  an  uproar  among  the 
people.' 

And  while  he  was  at  Bethany  in  the  house  of  Simon  the  leper, 
as  he  sat  at  table,  there  came  a  woman  having  an  alabaster  cruse 
of  precious  ointment  of  pure  balsam;  and  she  broke  the  cruse, 
and  poured  the  balsam  on  his  head.  And  some  were  angry,  saying 
among  themselves,  'Why  has  this  waste  of  ointment  been  com- 
mitted ?  For  it  might  have  been  sold  for  more  than  three  hundred 
pieces  of  silver,  and  have  been  given  to  the  poor.'  And  they  re- 
proached her.  But  Jesus  said,  'Let  her  alone;  why  plague  ye 
her  ?  she  has  wrought  a  good  deed  towards  me.  For  ye  have  the 
poor  with  you  always,  and  whensoever  ye  will  ye  may  do  them 
good :  but  me  ye  have  not  always.  She  has  done  what  she  could : 
she  has  anointed  my  body  beforehand  for  its  burial.  Verily  I  say 
unto  you,  Wherever  the  gospel  shall  be  preached  throughout  the 
whole  world,  that  which  she  has  done  shall  also  be  spoken  of  in 
her  memory.' 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  3 1 

And  Judas  Iscariot,  one  of  the  Twelve,  departed  unto  the  chief 
priests,  to  betray  him  unto  them.  And  when  they  heard  it,  they 
were  glad,  and  promised  to  give  him  money.  And  he  sought  a 
good  opportunity  to  betray  him. 

And  on  the  first  day  of  unleavened  bread,  when  they  sacrifice 
the  passover,  his  disciples  said  unto  him, '  Whither  wouldst  thou 
that  we  go  and  prepare  for  thee  to  eat  the  passover  ?'  And  he  sent 
two  of  his  disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Go  ye  into  the  city,  and 
a  man  will  meet  you  bearing  a  pitcher  of  water :  follow  him.  And 
into  whatever  house  he  goes  in,  say  ye  to  the  master  thereof,  The 
Master  says,  Where  is  my  chamber  where  I  may  eat  the  passover 
with  my  disciples  ?  And  he  will  shew  you  a  large  upper  room, 
furnished  with  couches  and  ready ;  there  prepare  for  us.'  And  his 
disciples  departed,  and  came  into  the  city,  and  found  as  he  had 
said  unto  them :  and  they  prepared  the  passover. 

And  in  the  evening  he  went  thither  with  the  Twelve.  And  as 
they  sat  and  ate,  Jesus  said,  '  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  One  of  you 
will  betray  me,  who  is  now  eating  with  me.'  And  they  were 
grieved,  and  said  unto  him,  one  after  the  other,  'Surely  not  I?' 
And  he  answered  and  said  unto  them, '  One  of  the  Twelve,  who 
dippeth  with  me  into  the  dish.  For  the  Son  of  man  indeed  de- 
parteth,  as  it  is  written  of  him :  but  woe  to  that  man  by  whom 
the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed !  Better  were  it  for  that  man  if  he 
had  never  been  born.' 

And  while  they  were  eating,  Jesus  took  bread,  and  said  the 
blessing,  and  broke  it,  and  gave  it  to  them,  and  said,  '  Take,  this 
is  my  body.'  And  he  took  a  cup,  and  spake  the  blessing,  and  gave 
it  to  them :  and  they  all  drank  of  it.  And  he  said  unto  them, 
'This  is  my  blood  of  the  covenant,  which  is  shed  for  many. 
Verily  I  say  unto  you,  I  shall  not  drink  again  of  the  fruit  of  the 
vine,  until  that  day  when  I  drink  it  new  in  the  kingdom  of  God.' 

And  after  they  had  sung  the  Hallel,  they  went  out  to  the 
mount  of  Olives.  And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  Ye  will  all  stumble ; 
for  it  is  written,  I  will  smite  the  shepherd,  and  the"  sheep  will  be 
scattered.  But  after  I  have  risen,  I  will  go  before  you  to  Galilee.' 
But  Peter  said  unto  him,  '  Even  if  all  shall  stumble,  yet  will  not  I.' 
And  Jesus  said  unto  him,  '  Verily  I  say  unto  thee.  This  day,  even 
in  this  night,  before  the  cock  crow  twice,  thou  wilt  deny  me  thrice.' 


32  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

But  he  spoke  the  more  vehemently,  '  If  I  must  die  with  thee, 
I  will  not  deny  thee.'     So  also  said  they  all. 

And  they  came  to  a  place  which  was  named  Gethsemane :  and 
he  said  to  his  disciples, '  Sit  ye  here,  while  I  pray.'  And  he  took 
with  him  Peter  and  James  and  John.  And  he  began  to  be  dis- 
tressed and  troubled,  and  he  said  unto  them, '  My  soul  is  exceeding 
sorrowful  unto  death :  tarry  ye  here,  and  watch.'  And  he  went 
forward  a  little,  and  threw  himself  upon  the  ground,  and  prayed 
that,  if  it  were  possible,  the  hour  might  pass  from  him.  And  he 
said,  '  Abba,  Father,  all  things  are  possible  unto  thee ;  take  away 
this  cup  from  me :  nevertheless  not  what  I  will,  but  what  thou 
wilt.'  And  he  came  and  found  them  sleeping,  and  said  unto  Peter, 
'  Simon,  sleepest  thou  ?  Couldest  not  thou  watch  one  hour?  Watch 
ye  and  pray,  that  ye  come  not  into  temptation.  The  spirit  is 
willing,  but  the  flesh  is  weak.'  And  again  he  went  away,  and 
prayed,  speaking  the  same  words.  And  he  returned,  and  found 
them  asleep  again,  for  their  eyes  were  heavy ;  and  they  knew  not 
what  to  answer  him.  And  he  came  the  third  time,  and  said  unto 
them,  '  Sleep  ye  still  and  take  your  rest  ?  It  is  enougL  The 
hour  is  come ;  behold,  the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed  into  the  hands 
of  sinners.  Bise  up,  let  us  go;  lo,  he  that  betrayeth  me  is  at 
hand.' 

And  immediately,  while  he  yet  spoke,  came  Judas,  one  of  the 
Twelve,  and  with  him  a  band  with  swords  and  bludgeons  from  the 
chief  priests  and  the  scribes  and  the  Elders.  Now  the  betrayer 
had  given  them  a  token,  saying,  '  Whomsoever  I  kiss,  that  is  he ; 
seize  him,  and  lead  him  away  safely.'  So  as  soon  as  he  had  come, 
he  went  straightway  up  to  Jesus,  and  said, '  Master ' ;  and  kissed 
him.  And  they  laid  their  hands  on  him,  and  seized  him.  But 
one  of  the  bystanders  drew  his  sword,  and  smote  the  servant  of  the 
high  priest,  and  cut  off  his  ear.  And  Jesus  answered  and  said 
unto  them,  'Have  ye  come  out  to  capture  me  with  swords  and 
with  bludgeons,  as  if  against  a  thief?  I  was  daily  with  you  in 
the  temple,  teaching,  and  ye  seized  me  not : — but  the  scriptures 
must  be  fulfilled.'  Then  they  all  forsook  him,  and  fled.  Yet  i 
young  man  followed  him,  clad  only  in  a  linen  shirt  upon  his  naked 
body ;  and  they  seized  him.  But  he  let  the  linen  shirt  slip,  and 
fled  from  them  naked. 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDING  TO  MARK  33 

And  they  led  Jesus  away  to  the  high  priest :  and  all  the  chief 
priests  and  the  Elders  and  the  scribes  assembled  together.  And 
Peter  followed  him  at  a  distance  unto  the  court  of  the  high  priest : 
and  he  sat  with  the  servants,  and  warmed  himself  at  the  fire. 
And  the  chief  priests  and  all  the  High  Court  sought  for  evidence 
against  Jesus,  to  put  him  to  death ;  but  they  found  none.  For 
many  bore  false  witness  against  him,  but  their  evidence  did  not 
agree.  Then  some  rose  up,  and  bore  false  witness  against  him, 
saying,  '  We  heard  him  say,  I  will  destroy  this  temple  which  is 
made  with  hands,  and  after  three  days  I  will  build  another  made 
without  hands.'  But  even  in  this  their  evidence  did  not  agree. 
Then  the  high  priest  stood  up  among  them,  and  asked  Jesus, 
saying,  'Answerest  thou  nothing  to  that  which  these  bear  witness 
against  thee?'  But  he  held  his  peace,  and  answered  nothing. 
Again  the  high  priest  asked  him,  and  said  unto  him,  'Art  thou 
the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  the  Blessed  One  ?'  And  Jesus  said, '  I  am : 
and  ye  shall  see  the  Son  of  man  sitting  off  the  right  hand  of  the 
Power,  and  coming  with  the  clouds  of  heaven.'  Then  the  high 
priest  rent  his  clothes,  and  said,  '  What  further  need  have  we  of 
witnesses  ?  Ye  have  heard  the  blasphemy  :  what  think  ye  ?'  And 
they  all  condemned  him  to  be  guilty  of  death. 

And  some  began  to  spit  on  him  [and  to  cover  his  face],  and 
to  strike  him  with  their  fists,  and  to  say  unto  him,  'Prophesy': 
and  the  servants  dealt  him  blows. 

Now  Peter  was  below  in  the  court.  And  one  of  the  maids  of 
the  high  priest  came,  and  when  she  saw  Peter  warming  himself, 
she  looked  at  him,  and  said,  'Thou  too  wast  with  Jesus  the 
Nazarene.'  But  he  denied  it,  saying,  'I  do  not  know  or  under- 
stand what  thou  sayest.'  And  he  went  out  into  the  outer  court- 
yard. And  the  cock  crowed.  And  the  maid  saw  him,  and  began 
again  to  say  to  the  bystanders,  '  This  is  one  of  them.'  And  he 
denied  it  again.  And  a  little  after,  the  bystanders  said  again  to 
Peter,  'Verily  thou  art  one  of  them:  for  thou  art  a  Galilaean.' 
But  he  began  to  curse  and  to  swear,  saying,  'I  know  not  this  man 
of  whom  ye  speak.'  And  straightway  the  cock  crowed  a  second 
time.  Then  Peter  called  to  mind  the  word  which  Jesus  had  said 
unto  him,  '  Before  the  cock  crow  twice,  thou  wilt  deny  me  thrice.' 
And  he  wept. 

M.  3 


34  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 


CHAPTER  XV 


And  straightway  in  the  early  morning  the  chief  priests,  with 
the  Elders  and  scribes,  and  the  whole  council  prepared  their 
decision,  and  having  bound  Jesus,  led  him  away,  and  delivered 
him  to  Pilate.  And  Pilate  asked  him,  'Art  thou  the  King  of 
the  Jews  ?'  And  he  answering  said  unto  him, '  Thou  sayest  it.' 
And  the  chief  priests  vehemently  accused  him:  but  he  answered 
nothing.  And  Pilate  asked  him  again,  saying,  '  Answerest  thou 
nothing  ?  see,  of  how  much  they  accuse  thee !'  But  Jesus 
answered  nothing  more ;  so  that  Pilate  marvelled. 

Now  at  the  festival,  he  used  to  release  unto  them  one  prisoner, 
whom  they  chose  to  beg  off.  And  the  so-called  Barabbas  lay 
bound  with  the  rioters  who  had  committed  a  murder  in  the  in- 
surrection. And  the  crowd  came  up,  and  began  to  demand  what 
Pilate  was  wont  to  do  for  them.  But  he  answered  them,  saying, 
'  Do  ye  wish  that  I  release  unto  you  the  King  of  the  Jews  ? '  For 
he  realized  that  the  chief  priests  had  delivered  him  up  out  of  envy. 
But  the  chief  priests  incited  the  people,  that  he  should  rather 
release  Barabbas  unto  them.  And  Pilate  answered  again  and  said 
unto  them, '  What  then  shall  I  do  with  him  whom  ye  call  the  King 
of  the  Jews  ?'  And  they  cried  out  in  answer, '  Crucify  him.'  Then 
Pilate  said  unto  them,  '  What  evil  has  he  done  ?'  But  they  cried 
out  the  more  vehemently,  '  Crucify  him.'  And  so  Pilate,  wishing 
to  content  the  people,  released  Barabbas  unto  them,  and  delivered 
Jesus,  when  he  had  scourged  him,  to  be  crucified. 

Then  the  soldiers  led  him  away  into  the  courtyard,  which 
is  the  Praetorium;  and  they  called  together  the  whole  cohort. 
And  they  clothed  him  with  purple,  and  wove  a  crown  of  thorns, 
and  put  it  upon  his  head,  and  they  began  to  salute  him,  'Hail, 
King  of  the  Jews ! '  And  they  beat  him  on  the  head  with  a  cane, 
and  spat  upon  him,  and  bent  the  knee,  and  did  him  reverence. 
And  when  they  had  mocked  him  thus,  they  took  off  the  purple 
from  him,  and  put  his  own  clothes  on  him,  and  led  him  out  to 
crucify  him. 

And  they  compelled  one  Simon  of  Cyrene  (the  father  of 
Alexander  and  Rufus),  who  happened  to  be  passing  by  from  the 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  35 

country,  to  carry  his  cross.  And  they  brought  him  unto  the  place 
Golgotha,  which  is,  being  translated,  The  place  of  a  skull.  And 
they  offered  him  wine  mixed  with  myrrh :  but  he  did  not  take  it. 
And  they  crucified  him,  and  they  divided  his  garments,  casting 
lots  for  them,  what  each  man  should  take.  And  it  was  the  third 
hour  when  they  crucified  him.  And  the  inscription  of  the  charge 
against  him  was  written  above  him:  'The  King  of  the  Jews.' 
And  with  him  they  crucified  two  thieves;  the  one  on  his  right 
hand,  and  the  other  on  his  left. 

And  the  passers-by  reviled  him,  wagging  their  heads,  and 
saying,  'Ah,  thou  that  destroyest  the  temple,  and  buildest  it  in 
three  days,  save  thyself,  and  come  down  from  the  cross.'  Likewise 
also  the  chief  priests  with  the  scribes  mocked  him,  saying  to  one 
another, '  He  saved  others ;  himself  he  cannot  save.  The  Messiah ! 
The  King  of  Israel !  Let  him  descend  now  from  the  cross,  that  we 
may  see  and  believe.'  And  they  that  were  crucified  with  him 
scoffed  at  him. 

And  at  the  sixth  hour  darkness  came  over  the  whole  land 
until  the  ninth  hour.  And  at  the  ninth  hour  Jesus  cried  with 
a  loud  voice,  saying,  'Eli,  Eli,  lama  sabachthani?'  which  is,  being 
translated,  '  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ? ' 
And  some  of  the  bystanders,  when  they  heard  it,  said, '  Behold,  he 
calls  Elijah.'  And  one  ran  and  filled  a  sponge  full  of  vinegar,  and 
put  it  on  a  cane,  and  gave  him  to  drink,  saying, '  Let  alone ;  let  us 
see  whether  Elijah  will  come  to  take  him  down.'  But  Jesus 
uttered  a  loud  cry,  and  expired.  And  the  curtain  of  the  temple 
was  rent  in  twain  from  the  top  to  the  bottom.  And  when  the 
centurion,  who  stood  by,  opposite  to  him,  saw  that  he  so  expired, 
he  said, '  Truly  this  man  was  a  Son  of  God.' 

There  were  also  some  women  looking  on  from  a  distance,  among 
■  whom  was  Mary  Magdalene,  and  Mary  the  mother  of  James  the 
•  Little  and  of  Joses,  and  Salome  (who  already,  when  he  was  in 
'  dalilee,  had  followed  him,  and  attended  to  him) ;  and  many  other 
f  women  who  came  up  with  him  unto  Jerusalem. 
'  And  as  the  evening  was  already  at  hand,  because  it  was 
the  Preparation,  that  is,  the  day  before  the  sabbath,  Joseph  of 
S'Arimathaea,  an  honourable  councillor  who  himself  too  was  waiting 
*ior  the  kingdom  of  God,  came,  and  ventured  to  go  to  Pilate,  and 

3—2 


36  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 

asked  for  the  body  of  Jesus.  And  Pilate  marvelled  that  he  should 
have  already  died,  and  he  summoned  the  centurion,  and  asked  him 
whether  he  was  long  dead.  And  when  he  was  informed  by  the 
centurion,  he  gave  the  body  to  Joseph.  And  he  bought  fine  Unen, 
and  took  him  down,  and  wrapped  him  in  the  linen,  and  laid  him 
in  a  sepulchre  which  was  hewn  out  of  a  rock,  and  rolled  a  stone 
against  the  door  of  the  sepulchre.  And  Mary  Magdalene  and  Mary 
the  mother  of  Joses  watched  where  he  was  laid. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

And  when  the  sabbath  was  over,  Mary  Magdalene,  and  Mary 
the  mother  of  James,  and  Salome,  bought  sweet  spices,  that  they 
might  go  and  anoint  him.  And  very  early  in  the  morning  of  the 
first  day  of  the  week,  they  came  unto  the  sepulchre,  at  the  rising 
of  the  sun.  And  they  said  among  themselves, '  Who  will  roll  away 
for  us  the  stone  from  the  door  of  the  sepulchre  ?'  And  when  they 
looked,  they  saw  that  the  stone  had  been  rolled  away :  for  it  was 
very  great.  And  entering  into  the  sepulchre,  they  saw  a  young 
man  sitting  on  the  right  side,  clothed  in  a  long  white  garment; 
and  they  were  sore  afraid.  But  he  said  unto  them,  'Be  not 
afraid:  ye  seek  Jesus  the  crucified  Nazarene;  he  is  risen;  he  is 
not  here :  behold  the  place  where  they  laid  him.  But  go,  tell  his 
disciples  and  Peter  that  he  goeth  before  you  into  Galilee :  there 
shall  ye  see  him,  as  he  said  unto  you.'  And  they  went  out,  and 
fled  from  the  sepulchre ;  for  they  trembled  and  were  amazed : 
and  they  said  nothing  to  any  one;   for  they  were  afraid. 

[Now  after  he  had  risen,  early  on  the  first  day  of  the  week,  he 
appeared  first  to  Mary  Magdalene,  out  of  whom  he  had  cast  seven 
devils.  And  she  went  and  told  them  that  had  been  with  him,  as 
they  mourned  and  wept.  And  they,  when  they  heard  that  he  was 
alive,  and  had  been  seen  by  her,  believed  it  not.  After  that  he 
appeared  in  another  form  unto  two  of  them,  as  they  were  walking 
and  going  into  the  country.  And  they  went  and  told  it  unto  the 
others,  but  they  did  not  believe  even  them. 

Afterward  he  appeared  unto  the  eleven  as  they  sat  at  table. 


THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  37 

and  upbraided  them  with  their  unbelief  and  hardness  of  heart, 
because  they  believed  not  them  who  had  seen  him  risen.  And  he 
said  unto  them, '  Go  ye  throughout  all  the  world,  and  preach  the 
gospel  to  every  creature.  He  that  believeth  and  is  baptized  shall 
be  saved ;  but  he  that  believeth  not  shall  be  condemned.  And 
these  signs  shall  follow  them  that  believe :  In  my  name  shall  they 
cast  out  demons ;  they  shall  speak  with  new  tongues ;  they  shall 
take  up  serpents;  and  if  they  drink  any  deadly  thing,  it  shall 
not  hurt  them ;  they  shall  lay  hands  on  the  sick,  and  they  shall 
recover.' 

Now  after  the  Lord  had  spoken  unto  them,  he  was  taken  up 
into  heaven,  and  sat  down  on  the  right  hand  of  God.  But  they 
went  forth,  and  preached  everywhere,  the  Lord  helping  them  and 
confirming  the  Word  through  the  signs  which  followed  it.] 


EAST  LONDON  FUND  FOR  THE  JEWS. 


Lending  and  Reference  Library. 


MARK 

CHAPTER  I 

1-8.    John  the  Baptist 
(Cp.  Matt.  iii.  i-6,  ii,  12;  Luke  iii.  r-6,  15-18) 

1  The  beginning  of  the  gospel   concerning  Jesus   Christ,  the 

2  Son  of  God.  As  it  is  written  in  Isaiah  the  prophet,  'Behold, 
I  send  my  messenger  before  thee,  who  shall  prepare  the  way  for 

3  thee.     The   voice  of  one  crying   in  the  wilderness.  Prepare  ye 

4  the  way  of  the  Lord,  make  his  paths  straight.'  So  John  the 
Baptist  appeared  in  the  wilderness,  proclaiming  the  baptism  of 

5  repentance  for  the  forgiveness  of  sins.  And  there  went  out 
unto  him  all  the  land  of  Judsea,  and  all  the  inhabitants  of  Jeru- 
salem, and  they  were  baptized   by  him  in  the  river  of  Jordan, 

6  confessing  their  sins.  And  John's  clothing  was  of  camel's  hair, 
and  he  had  a  leathern  girdle  about  his  loins ;  and  he  ate  locusts 

7  and  wild  honey.  And  he  proclaimed,  saying,  'After  me  cometh 
one  who  is  mightier  than  I,  the  latchet  of  whose  shoes  I  am  not 

8  worthy  to  stoop  down  and  unloose.  I  have  baptized  you  with 
water:   but  he  will  baptize  you  with  the  Holy  Spirit.' 

The  object  of  these  notes  is  by  no  means  to  make  another 
commentary  superfluous  even  for  a  Jewish  reader.  There  are 
many  points  and  difficulties  in  the  Gospels  about  which  my  notes 
will  give  little  explanation  or  which  I  shall  discuss  inadequately— 
and  this  partly  from  lack  of  space  and  largely  from  lack  of  learning. 

My  main  purpose  has  been  to  concentrate  attention  upon  those 
passages  in  the  Gospels  which  have  religious  value  or  interest  for 
Jewish  readers  at  the  present  time.  Passages  which  do  not  possess 
this  interest  or  value  I  have  sometimes  dealt  with  rather  cursorily. 
It  is  not  implied  that  such  passages  do  not  possess  other  kinds  of 
interest,  historical  or  theological,  even  for  Jewish  readers.  They 
may  also  be  of  great  importance  for  the  full  comprehension  of  the 


I.  1-8]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  39 

Gospels  as  a  whole.  They  may  possess  great  religious  interest  for 
the  student  of  religion,  to  whatever  creed  he  belongs,  and  great 
religious  value  to  the  Christian  believer.  All  I  mean  is  that  they 
have  comparatively  little  interest  or  value  to  Jewish  readers  from 
a  purely  religious  point  of  view. 

Among  the  inadequately  discussed  passages  are  some  which 
have  special  relation  to  Christian  dogma  and  belief  concerning  the 
person  and  Messianic  consciousness  of  Jesus.  These  are  treated 
from  a  purely  historical  point  of  view.  No  attempt  is  made  to 
discuss  how  far  Jesus  was  right  or  wrong  in  any  claim  he  may  have 
made,  or  any  consciousness  that  he  may  have  had,  that  he  stood 
nearer  to  God  than  any  other  member  of  the  human  race.  My 
point  of  view  is  frankly  that  of  a  Jew,  that  is  of  some  one  who 
stands  outside  every  form  and  phase  of  Christianity.  I  try  to  write 
about  Jesus  as  an  impartial  but  sympathetic,  critical  but  ap- 
preciative, Christian  believer  might  write  about  Mahommed  or 
Buddha.  That  Jesus  did  not  literally  fulfil  the  Old  Testament 
conditions  and  characteristics  of  the  'Messiah'  is  obvious.  Whether 
he  fulfilled  them  in  some  higher  and  spiritual  sense  it  is  in  these 
notes  unnecessary  for  me  to  discuss.  Jesus  is  not '  our  Lord '  to 
the  Jewish  reader,  and  can  never  become  so.  Our  interest  in  him, 
from  the  purely  religious  point  of  view,  is  limited  to  his  con- 
tributions to  religious  teaching.  That  the  love  of  him  and  the 
service  of  him  have  been,  and  are,  immense  motives  to  Christians 
of  all  sorts  and  shades,  no  one  can  deny ;  such  love  and  service 
can  with  Jews  be  felt  and  rendered  only  to  God.  Thus,  whether 
Jesus  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  and  in  what  sense  and  at  what 
stage  of  his  life ;  whether  he  thought  himself  nearer  to  God  than 
all  other  men ;  whether,  and  in  what  sense,  he  believed  himself  to 
be  the  Son  of  God — all  these  to  Jewish  readers  are  questions  of 
a  purely  historical  and  scientific  interest.  We  shall  not  admire 
his  moral  and  religious  teaching  either  more  or  less  because  he 
believed  himself,  or  did  not  believe  himself,  to  be  the  Messiah ; 
we  shall  certainly  not  admire  his  character  more  if  he  thought 
himself  the  '  Son  of  God '  in  a  special  sense ;  we  shall  assuredly 
not  admire  it  less  if  he  did  not. 

Mark  has  a  very  brief  introduction  before  coming  to  close  grips 
with  his  subject — the  life  and  the  death  of  the  Messiah.  A  few 
necessary  lines  about  John  the  Baptist  lead  on  to  the  baptism 
of  Jesus,  and  then  to  the  beginnings  of  his  ministry.  Mark  pre- 
sumably knows  no  details  of  his  ancestry,  or  of  his  childhood  or 
birth.  Indeed  he  passes  over  the  baptism  and  the  return  to 
Galilee  and  the  first  preaching  there  with  a  few  short  and  rapid 
strokes,  so  that  one  can  regard  the  introduction  as  extending  to 


40  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  i-8 

IS  (so  W.)  with  as  much  justification  as  confining  it  to  i-8. 
Mark  starts  the  details  of  his  story  with  the  coming  of  the  new 
Preacher  to  the  Lake  of  Galilee  and  to  Capernaum.  Of  what 
happened  before  that  he  seems  to  know  no  more  than  the  barest 
outline  as  regards  the  baptism  (9-1 1),  the  temptation  (12,  13) 
and  the  earliest  preaching  in  Galilee  (14,  15).  It  may  be  argued 
that  Peter's  recollections,  of  which,  it  is  believed,  Mark  made  use, 
could  naturally  go  no  further  back  than  the  incidents  which  come 
before  us  in  i.  16  and  after. 

I.  It  seems  best,  with  W.,  to  put  a  full  stop  at  the  end  of  the 
verse  after  the  words  '  Son  of  God,'  and  to  translate  '  Beginning 
of  the  gospel  about  Jesus  Christ,  the  Son  of  God.'  The  words 
are  the  title  for  the  whole  book.  They  mean :  The  beginning  of 
the  story  of  Jesus  Christ. 

'  In  the  apostolic  age  the  word  gospel  does  not  denote  a  book, 
but  a  spoken  proclamation.  Only  in  the  second  century  did  the 
Lives  of  Christ  begin  to  be  called  Gospels.  The  original  gospel 
was  a  spoken  proclamation  of  the  great  Christian  facte,  the 
Messiahship  of  Jesus  and  the  fulfilment  of  the  prophecies  in 
Him.'  The  earthly  life  of  Jesus  was  only  the  beginning  of  this 
proclamation.  The  more  important  part  was  that  which  came 
after  his  death  and  was  still  to  come.  Hence  '  what  Mark  pro- 
poses to  tell  is  how  the  gospel  began  in  the  earthly  ministry  of 
Jesus'  (Menzies). 

The  origin  of  the  technical  meaning  of  the  word  evangelion 
(evayyeXiov), '  good  tidings '  or  '  gospel,'  is  apparently  to  be  found 
partly  in  the  use  of  the  verb  (evaiyyeXt^oj)  in  the  Greek  version  of 
the  later  chapters  of  Isaiah,  partly  in  the  already  current  Greek 
use  of  the  noun  to  signify  '  good  tidings.'  The  noun,  evayyiXiov, 
occurs  in  the  Greek  translation  of  the  Old  Testament  (Septua- 
gint)  two  or  three  times,  and  also  another  form  evayyeXia.  The 
verb  evayye\i^ei,v  occurs  some  twenty  times.  The  passages  in 
Isaiah  xl.  9,  Hi.  7,  Ix.  6,  Ixi.  i,  are  worth  looking  up.  So,  too, 
Psalms  xl.  9,  Ixviii.  11,  and  xcvi.  2.  The  word  has  also  been 
found  in  inscriptions  in  connection  with  the  worship  of  the 
Emperors.  It  occurs  in  a  now  famous  inscription  found  at  Priene 
in  a  passage  about  the  birthday  of  the  divine  Augustus  (the 
date  is  about  9  B.C.).  '  [The  birthday]  of  the  god  was  for  the 
world  the  beginning  of  good  tidings  on  account  of  him '  {t&v  St' 
avTov  evayyeXlcov,  cp.  Deissmann,  Licht  vom  Osten,  p.  267).  It 
is  a  pity  that  we  have  not  adopted  an  identical  rendering  in 
English  (i.e. '  evangel '  instead  of  '  gospel '),  like  the  German  '  daa 
Evangelium.' 

The  oldest  use  of  the  word  in  Christian  literature  is  reflected 


I.  1-8]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  41 

in  Mark.  W.  holds  that  in  its  special  Christian  sense  the  word 
could  not  have  been  used  by  Jesus.  For,  in  Mark,  Jesus  himself 
is,  almost  always,  the  content  of  the  gospel.  He  is  the  good 
tidings.  He  is  the  gospel.  In  this  sense  too  is  the  word  em- 
ployed by  Paul.  Mark's  whole  book  is  to  be  the  story  of  the 
career  and  death  of  Jesus  the  Messiah.  Hence  his  book  is  the 
gospel  of  Jesus.  Jesus  in  Mark  is  made  to  follow  and  adopt  this 
usage.  Out  of  seven  times  in  which  the  word  is  used,  five  occur 
in  speeches  of  Jesus.  (The  other  two  places  are  i.  i  and  i.  14.) 
He  speaks  of  the  gospel,  meaning  not  what  he  has  to  say  and 
teach  about  religion,  morality,  and  the  Kingdom,  but  practically 
himself.  '  For  my  sake  and  for  the  gospel's '  are  close  synonyms. 
'For  the  sake  of  the  gospel '  means  for  the  sake  of  making  known 
the  tidings  about  Jesus.  '  The  gospel  is  to  be  preached  unto  all 
the  nations '  means  that  Jesus  Christ  and  his  life  and  death  are 
to  be  preached.  The  one  exception  to  this  usage  in  Mark  seems  to 
be  i.  14,  15,  where,  however,  in  truth  the  meaning  is  still  the  same, 
however  inappropriately  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus.  Jesus  could 
only  have  said  '  Repent,  for  the  Kingdom  is  near ' ;  the  words 
'  Believe  in  the  gospel '  would  have  had  no  meaning  to  his  con- 
temporaries at  the  outset  of  his  ministry.  Jesus  is  thus  made  to 
use  the  word  in  a  proleptic  or  anticipatory  sense. 

In  Matthew,  and  in  Luke  (who  only  employs  the  verb  and  not 
the  noun,  whereas  Mark  and  Matthew  employ  only  the  noun  and 
not  the  verb,  except  Matt.  xi.  5),  the  usage  is  different.  To 
them  the  gospel  is  the  contents  of  Jesus's  teaching.  The  gospel  of 
the  Kingdom  means  the  tidings  and  teaching  about  the  Kingdom. 
Jesus  proclaims  that  with  him  the  Kingdom  has  appeared  upon 
earth,  and  this  proclamation  is  the  gospel.  His  teaching  is  the 
gospel  which  he  preaches.  But  this  use  of  the  word  is  not  earlier 
than  its  use  in  Mark,  but  later,  just  as  the  Kingdom  as  present  is 
later  than  the  Kingdom  as  future. 

It  is  disputed  whether  the  oldest  reading  had  '  Son  of  God ' 
after  the  words  'Jesus  Christ.'  If  it  had,  the  phrase  must  be 
understood  either  in  the  same  sense  as  in  iii.  11,  or  in  the  higher 
Pauline  sense  as  a  heavenly  being,  of  divine  nature,  though  distinct 
from  and  subordinate  to  God.     See  i.  1 1  and  iii.  1 1. 

'Jesus  Christ.'  The  wording  was  originally  'Jesus  the  Christ'; 
'  Jesus  the  Anointed ' ;  '  Jesus  the  Messiah.'  But  here  '  Christ ' 
has  already  become  a  proper  name,  a  surname  for  Jesus ;  therefore 
it  has  lost  the  article.  This  is  a  rare  use.  In  Mark  it  is  only 
found  again  in  ix.  41.     Merx  {Bie  Vier  kanonischen  Evangelien, 

II.  2,  p.  10)  attempts  to  show  that  the  original  wording  was 
probably  'Beginning  of  the  gospel';  then  'Jesus  Christ'  was 
added,   and   to    this   was   appended   'Son    of   God.'      For    the 


42  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  U-  i-8 

Rabbinic  use  of  the  word '  Chriet '  or '  Messiah,'  as  a  personal  name, 
see  Additional  Note  i. 

2,  3.  W.  and  Loisy  regard  the  quotation  as  a  very  early 
interpolation.  Mark  never  in  his  own  person  quotes  the  Old 
Testament.  There  are  other  difficulties.  The  quotation  is  made 
up  of  Malachi  iii.  i  and  Isaiah  xl.  3.  Was  the  Malachi  passage 
erroneously  supposed  to  come  from  Isaiah  ?  Or  is  the  Isaiah 
quotation  original  to  the  writer  of  verse  i,  and  was  the  Malachi 
passage  prefixed  later?  The  latter  is  more  probable.  In  Matt, 
xi.  10  (Q)  and  Luke  vii.  27  the  Malachi  passage  is  applied  to  John 
by  Jesus.  B.  Weiss,  on  the  other  hand,  regards  the  whole  passage 
as  a  reminiscence  of  Q  (the  old,  extra  source  of  Matthew  and 
Luke),  but  not  as  an  interpolation  {Die  Quellen,  A,  pp.  189-192, 
B,  p.  200). 

The  Malachi  quotation  follows  the  Hebrew  rather  than  the 
Septuagint,  which  is  another  reason  why  it  may  be  regarded  as 
not  having  been  inserted  at  the  same  time  as  the  Isaiah  quota- 
tion, which  follows  the  Septuagint.  But  the  Malachi  quotation 
makes  an  important  change  from  the  Hebrew  to  render  it  suit- 
able for  the  context.  The  Hebrew  has :  '  Behold  I  send  my 
messenger,  and  he  shall  prepare  a  way  before  me.'  Whereas 
Mark  has  :  '  my  messenger  before  thy  face,  who  shall  prepare  thy 
way,'  that  is  before  the  face  of  Jesus.  The  way  which  John  pre- 
pared may  be  taken  to  mean  his  preaching  of  repentance.  There 
is  also  a  notable  change  in  the  quotation  from  Isaiah  (which 
otherwise  follows  the  Septuagint  and  erroneously  adds  'in  the 
wilderness '  to  '  a  voice  that  cries,'  instead  of  to  '  prepare  ye ' :  see 
Revised  Version).  Septuagint  and  Hebrew  read  alike:  'make 
straight  in  the  desert  a  highway  for  our  God.'  But  in  lieu  of  '  a 
highway  for  our  God '  Mark  puts  '  his  paths.'  The  object  of  this 
seemingly  small  change  was  to  make  '  the  Lord '  of  the  first  clause 
a  synonym,  not  for  God,  but  for  the  Messiah — a  complete  violation 
of  the  original.  Evangelists  and  Rabbis  were  both  frequently 
guilty  of  forced  and  strained  interpolations  of  the  text.  Here  we 
have  a  misrendering  or  alteration  for  religious  purposes.  It  may, 
however,  not  be  deliberate.  It  may  be  unconscious ;  under  the 
influence  of  preconceived  ideas,  writers  sometimes  misquoted 
from  memory  to  suit  their  own  views. 

4.  Without  the  quotations  the  order  would  be  clearer.  '  Be- 
ginning of  the  gospel.  John  was  in  the  desert,  preaching,'  &c. 
The  wording  is  notable :  'A  baptism  of  repentance  for  the  forgive- 
ness of  sins.' 

We  need  not  assume  that  the  baptism  is  regarded  as  a  sort  of 
magical  or  sacramental  prophylactic  or  safeguard.     Those  who  did 


I.  1-8]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  43 

not  repent  could  not  be  saved  at  the  Judgment,  whether  they  had 
been  baptized  or  not. 

The  baptism  is  to  be  the  outward  sign  of  an  inward  repentance, 
and  this  repentance  is  to  lead  to  the  forgiveness  of  sins.  It  was, 
as  Loisy  says,  in  view  of  the  coming  Kingdom  that  the  remission  of 
sins  was  urgent.  The  confession  is  to  be  understood  as  a  free, 
public  confession  and  of  a  general  character  {E.  S.  i.  p.  393). 

The  great  method  to  obtain  forgiveness,  according  to  Rabbinic 
doctrine,  was  through  repentance.  For  the  Rabbinic  doctrine  of 
repentance,  see  my  article  on  'Rabbinic  Conceptions  of  Repentance,' 
J.Q.R.  Vol.  XVI.  January  1904. 

For  the  Jewish  reference  to  John  and  for  the  Rabbinic  practice 
and  theory  of  baptism,  see  Additional  Notes  2  and  3. 

The  best  translation  seems  to  be :  '  John  the  Baptiser  appeared 
in  the  wilderness  and  preached,'  &c. 

The  wilderness  is  the  low  country  by  the  Jordan,  called  the 
Araba  (desert  or  steppe)  in  the  Old  Testament.  See  2  Sam. 
ii.  29,  &c. 

5.  The  concourse  of  people  must  be  exaggerated. 

The  immersion  was  the  worshipper's  own  act.  '  Baptized  by 
John'  would  mean  'under  his  influence  and  by  his  instigation 
and  sanction.' 

6.  His  dress  is  reminiscent  of  2  Kings  i.  8  and  Zech.  xiii.  4. 
His  food  indicates  the  ascetic. 

7.  At  once  with  John's  utterances  comes  up  the  vexed  question 
as  to  the  relation  of  Mark  and  Q.  It  is  pretty  certain  that  Q 
contained  a  record  of  John's  baptisms  and  preaching  of  which 
we  find  pieces  in  Matthew  and  Luke.  But  does  Mark  depend  on 
Q,  or  has  Q  used  Mark  ?  W.  strongly  urges  the  latter,  B.  Weiss 
the  former.  Mutually  independent  they  can  scarcely  have  been. 
The  detailed  arguments  do,  it  must  be  confessed,  plead  for  Weiss's 
view,  though  the  Q  which  Mark  knew  may  have  been  a  shorter 
and  more  primitive  Q  than  the  Q  which  Matthew  and  Luke  may 
have  used.  And  also :  '  II  peut  y  avoir  des  intermediaires  entre 
les  documents  primitifs  et  nos  ^vangiles.'  So  Loisy  (I.  p.  122, 
n.  3)  who  is  on  the  whole  on  Weiss's  side,  though  with  reserves 
and  caution.  Thus  he  says :  '  The  agreement  of  Matthew  and 
Luke  in  the  Baptist's  speech — notably  as  to  the  "fire" — has  led  to 
the  supposition  that  both  borrowed  it  from  a  common  source,  qui 
pourrait  avoir  ite  dlyreg4e  dans  Marc  lui-meme'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  40i)- 

John  proclaims  himself  to  be  the  forerunner  of  one  mightier 
than  he.  It  is  notable  that  Mark,  unlike  Matthew  and  Luke,  does 
not  represent  John  as  proclaiming  that  this  mightier  one  will  also 


44  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  i-8 

hold  the  Final  Judgment.  Yet  Mark  must  mean  that  John  is 
the  forerunner  of  the  Messiah.  John  proclaims  the  advent  of 
the  Messiah,  without  knowing  who  he  is.  If  he  did  announce 
the  Messiah's  near  advent,  he  did  not  refer  to  Jesus  in  particular. 
To  the  Evangelists,  however,  Jesus  is  the  Messiah,  and  thus  John, 
as  the  forerunner  of  Jesus,  is  the  forerunner  of  the  Messiah. 
Indeed,  the  urgency  of  the  call  to  repentance  hy  John  must  be  (as 
in  the  case  of  Jesus  in  verse  1$)  because  the  time  is  soon  at  hand 
when  repentance  will  be  impossible.  For  repentance  belongs  to, 
and  is  only  possible  within,  the  old  era.  The  new  era  will  show 
the  results  of  repentance  or  the  results  of  obstinate  sin. 

'  Mightier  than  I.'  In  what  respect  ?  Either  generally  more 
potent,  invested  by  God  with  greater  authority  (shown  in  his 
healings,  teachings,  miracles,  &c.),  or  specifically  in  the  higher 
mode  of  his  baptism. 

There  is  some  reason  to  believe  that  John  did  not  proclaim 
the  coming  of  the  Messiah.  The  story  in  Mark  is  coloured  by 
later  Christian  reflection.  In  any  case  John  did  not  recognize  in 
Jesus  the  Messiah :  Jesus  was  to  him  merely  one  among  the 
many  who  sought  baptism,  and  was  not  in  any  way  distinguished 
from  the  rest  by  a  supernatural  revelation  {cp.  Loisy,  i.  p.  185). 

8.  W.  says:  'The  baptism  with  Spirit  is  a  baptism  without 
water ;  i.e.  no  real  baptism,  but  a  substitution  for  it  by  means  of 
something  better.  This  higher  baptism  is  the  giving  of  the  Spirit, 
which  here  appears  as  the  speciality  of  the  mission  of  Jesus. 
Water  and  Spirit  are  here  opposites:  they  exclude  each  other. 
Afterwards  the  opposition  was  bridged  over  by  creating  a  Christian 
baptism  with  water  and  Spirit.  But  in  truth  the  Christian  com- 
munity only  adopted  the  rite  of  (water)  baptism  after  the  Master's 
death  from  the  disciples  of  John.' 

On  this  view, '  baptizing  with  the  Spirit '  means  a  baptism  in 
a  good  sense,  the  reception  of  a  precious  and  divine  gift.  The 
meaning  would  be  cognate  to  that  of  Isaiah  xliv.  3,  Joel  ii.  28. 
In  the  Messianic  age — in  the  Kingdom — the  Spirit  of  God  was  to 
be  poured  out  over  all  who  were  worthy  or  chosen  to  enjoy  the 
beatitudes  of  the  new  era.  The  possession  of  the  Spirit  meant  a 
higher  enlightenment,  a  fuller  knowledge  of  God,  a  more  perfect 
accomplishment  of  His  will.  On  the  other  hand,  the  extra  source 
of  Matthew  and  Luke  (Q)  spoke  of  a  baptism  with  '  Holy  Spirit 
and  fire'  (Matt.  iii.  12,  Luke  iii.  16).  But  some  think  that ' Holy 
Spirit'  has  been  inserted  from  Mark,  and  that  what  Q  had 
was  only  '  with  fire.'  This  would  mean  a  baptism  in  an  evil  or 
ironic  sense — a  baptism  of  punishment.  It  would  refer  to  the 
consuming  fire  of  the  Messianic  Judgment.     Cp.  Amos  vii.  4, 


I.  9-1 1]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  45 

Mai.  iii.  2.  And  it  may  be  argued  that  this  is  the  more  original 
version,  and  that  it  is  more  in  character  with  what  John  is  likely 
to  have  said.  So  e.g.  Loisy.  Mark  made  a  'Christian'  change 
substituting  'spirit'  for  'fire';  Matthew  and  Luke  combined  his 
reading  with  the  reading  of  the  source.  And  originally  doubtless 
what  John  said  was  more  different  still.  For  He  who  gives  the 
fire  baptism  to  sinners  is  not  the  Messiah  but  God.  'La  tra- 
dition chr^tienne  lui  a  fait  dire  du  Messie  ce  qu'il  avait  dit  de 
Dieu  meme '  {E.  S.  1.  p.  402). 


9-1 1.    The  Baptism  op  Jesus 
(Cp.  Matt.  iii.  13-17;  Luke  iii.  21,  22) 

g        And  it  came  to  pass  in  those  days,  that  Jesus  came  from 
Nazareth  in  Galilee,  and  was  baptized  by  John  in  the  Jordan. 

10  And  straightway  as  he  came  up  out  of  the  water,  he  saw  how 
the  heavens  parted,  and  the  Spirit  like  a  dove  descended  upon 

11  him.     And  a  voice  from  heaven  said,  'Thou  art  my  beloved  Son; 
in  thee  I  am  well  pleased.' 

A  complete  commentary  upon  the  Gospels  must  devote  pages 
to  this  tiny  section,  but  I  can  be  exceedingly  brief. 

The  religious  value  of  the  Gospels  for  Jewish  readers  to-day 
has  nothing  to  do  with  the  story  of  the  baptism.  Nevertheless, 
that  Jesus  was  baptized  by  John  may  be  regarded  as  historic.  It 
was,  moreover,  in  all  probability  a  turning-point  in  his  life — the 
near  antecedent  of  his  taking  up  John's  task  and  continuing 
John's  message,  though  on  other  lines.  We  cannot  tell  whether 
Jesus  thought  he  saw,  and  fancied  he  heard,  strange  sights  and 
sounds  on  that  occasion.  No  critical  reader  to-day  can  believe, 
I  suppose,  in  the  literal  truth  of  10  and  1 1.  For  him  the  question 
needs  no  discussion.  Jesus,  we  may  assume,  comes,  as  Matthew  says, 
with  the  express  purpose  of  being  baptized.  He  wants  to  hear  and 
see  the  new  prophet.  What  he  has  been  told  of  him  may  fit  in 
with  the  aspirations  and  presentiments  of  his  own  soul.  It  may 
be,  and  has  been,  asked :  was  he  conscious  of  special  sins  because 
he  sought  the  baptism  ?  It  is  not  necessary  to  believe  this : 
M.  Loisy  is  perhaps  not  too  'prepossessed'  when  he  says,  'The 
baptism  of  repentance  did  not  render  guilty  those  who  received  it 
without  sin ;  a  righteous  man  could  submit  to  it  in  order  to 
signify  his  determination  to  live  purely,  without  confessing  sins 
which  he  had  not  committed;  he  manifested  his  resolution  to 


46  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  9-1 1 

prepare  himself,  according  to  his  capacity,  for  the  coming  of  the 
Kingdom'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  405).  Perhaps  I  ought  just  to  notice  that 
B.  Weiss,  still  urging  the  dependence  here  of  Mark  upon  Q, 
considers  that  the  original  form  of  the  celestial  words  is  in  Matthew 
(iii.  17).  Now  there  the  voice  says,  not  'Thou  art,'  but  'This 
is '  &c.  Weiss  thinks  that  the  original  subject  of  elhev  (he  saw) 
was  not  Jesus,  but  John  (cp.  John  i.  32).  But  how  in  this  case 
could  John  have  ever  doubted  whether  Jesus  was  the  Messiah  ? 
And  how  could  such  an  idea  of  the  baptism  be  primitive  ?  So 
too  if,  as  Weiss  thinks,  Matt.  iii.  13-15  were  in  Q,  then  assuredly 
Q  in  such  a  form  is  no  early  document. 

10,  II.  What  may  be  the  historic,  or  rather  the  inward, 
psychological  fact  at  the  basis  of  the  stories  of  the  baptism  and 
the  temptation  it  is  impossible  to  say.  Yet  it  is  not  unhkely 
that  the  baptism  did  mark  a  decisive  epoch  in  the  views  and 
feelings  of  Jesus  as  to  his  mission,  and  that  it  was  succeeded  by 
no  less  important  developments  in  some  lonely  wanderings  in  the 
desert.  As  Loisy  says,  in  asserting  that  it  was  only  Jesus  who 
heard  and  saw,  Mark  is  as  much  a  psychologist  as  it  was  possible 
for  such  a  writer  to  be.  Loisy  himself  is  at  grave  variance  with 
most  critical  theologians  because  he  holds  that  in  one  important 
point  the  Evangelists  are  largely  in  the  right :  the  baptism  was 
the  moment  when  the  conviction  that  he  was,  or  would  be,  the 
Messiah  definitely  and  convincingly  entered  the  consciousness  of 
Jesus.  This  is  how  Loisy  pictures  to  himself  the  genesis  and 
growth  of  that  conviction. 

'  What  may  be  regarded  as  the  solid  foundation  of  the  tradi- 
tional narrative  is  that  Jesus  found  in  his  baptism  the  decisive 
revelation  of  his  Messianic  mission,  and  that  the  consciousness 
of  his  divine  sonship  took  hold  of  him  with  a  strength  which  it 
had  not  possessed  before  and  which  it  would  never  lose  again. 
But  tradition,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  has  never  held,  and  criticism 
cannot  admit,  that  this  revelation  was  strictly  the  first  revelation, 
that  it  was  not  prepared  by  the  whole  previous  life  of  Jesus,  and 
that  it  was  not  subsequently  completed.  The  revelation  of  the 
baptism  could  have  been  addressed  only  to  a  spirit  ready  to  receive 
it ;  on  the  other  hand,  the  historical  meaning  of  the  narrative  of 
the  temptation  is  that  Jesus  had  to  learn  more  of  the  divine 
conditions  of  his  mission ;  and  it  may  be  said  that  this  progressive 
instruction,  which  was  to  some  extent  the  result  of  experience, 
continued  till  his  death.  If  it  is  permissible  to  hazard  a  conjecture 
on  such  an  obscure  subject,  it  might  be  said  that  Jesus,  in  the 
humble  home  of  Nazareth,  had  grown  up  as  son  of  God  through 
piety,  through  the  expansion  of  his  pure  soul  under  the  eye  of  the 


I.  9-1 0  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  4/ 

heavenly  Father,  without  at  first  any  special  thought  of  the  great 
part  which  the  Son  of  God,  the  Messiah,  was  to  play  in  the  world 
being  mingled  with  the  intimate  converse  of  this  soul  with  God ; 
we  may  suppose  that  these  special  thoughts  presented  themselves 
to  him  later  on  either  through  the  mere  influence  of  the  current 
Messianic  ideas,  or  as  the  effect  of  the  preaching  of  John  which 
announced  the  near  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  ;  however  that 
may  be,  the  meeting  with  John  is  a  circumstance  that  is  wholly 
appropriate  to  a  definite  revelation ;  there,  by  the  side  of  the  prophet 
who  was  giving  himself  out  as  the  forerunner  of  the  Messiah,  or 
at  least  as  the  herald  of  the  heavenly  Kingdom,  Jesus,  who  was 
already  son  of  God  by  the  inward  consciousness  of  his  union  with 
the  heavenly  Father,  had  the  supreme  intuition  of  his  divine 
mission,  and  felt  himself  to  be  the  Son  of  God,  the  Messiah 
promised  to  Israel.  The  future  would  gradually  teach  him  how 
he  would  accomplish  this  mission,  and  it  was  the  moral  conditions 
of  his  vocation  which  at  first  appeared  most  clear  to  him.  But  it 
was  as  Messiah,  the  agent  and  the  founder  of  the  heavenly 
Kingdom,  that  he  determined  to  preach  the  gospel,  and  not  as  a 

Treacher  of  the  goodness  of  God  towards  sinners '  {E.  S.  i.  p.  408). 
erhaps  it  should  be  added  that  M.  Loisy  does  not  use  'fils  de 
dieu '  and  '  filiation  divine '  in  the  same  sense  as  that  in  which  it 
is  used  in  the  Christian  creeds.  As  regards  the  term  '  Son  of  God ' 
he  especially  states  in  a  footnote  that  W.  is  right  in  observing 
that  the  Messiah  is  called  Son  of  God,  like  Israel,  as  Israel's 
representative.  It  is  false,  he  adds,  that  the  term  was  coined 
by  Jesus  himself  as  the  expression  of  his  '  conscience  filiale,'  his 
special  '  Kindschaftsbewusstsein.'  Jesus  was  Son  of  God  as  the 
predestined  Messiah.  'In  the  Wisdom  of  Solomon  every  truly 
pious  man  is  a  "son  of  God,"  just  as  every  Jew  calls  God  his 
father'  (W.,  ilfarA;,  p.  6). 

Jesus,  then,  alone  sees  and  hears.  The  baptism  is  the  equiva- 
lent of  anointment.  The  words  uttered  by  the  voice  from  heaven 
are  a  reminiscence  of  Isaiah  xlii.  i,  'Behold  my  servant  whom  I 
uphold ;  my  chosen,  in  whom  my  soul  delighteth,'  and  Psalm  ii.  7, 
'  Thou  art  my  son ;  this  day  I  have  begotten  thee.'  6  vi6<:  /jlov  6 
dya'n-qro'i, '  Thou  art  my  beloved  son.'  Accordmg  to  W.  this  would 
mean  to  a  Semitic  writer,  not  '  my  beloved  son,'  but '  my  prefeired 
son,' '  mein  bevorzugter  Sohn ':  in  other  words,  '  my  best  loved  son.' 
It  is  not,  however,  intended  to  compare  Jesus  with  other  sons. 
Jesus,  in  his  own  consciousness,  knows  himself  now  to  be  the 
Messiah.  He  enters  the  water  as  an  ordinary  individual;  he 
comes  out  of  it  as  the  Son  of  God,  the  Messiah.  Thus,  according 
to  Mark,  Jesus  became  the  Son  of  God  at  his  baptism.  He  is  not 
the  Son  of  God  through  his  birth.    At  the  baptism  he  receives  the 


48  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  9-» 

Divine  Spirit  and  becomes  thereby,  as  Y&eiderer  (Urchristentum,!. 
p.  338)  says,  a  superhuman  being,  an  instrument  of  the  Spirit,  as 
he  shows  by  his  miracles.  The  immediate  effect  of  the  Spirit  is 
that  it  drives  him  forth  into  the  wilderness. 

The  view  that,  according  to  Mark,  the  baptism  made  Jesus  the 
Son  of  God  by  putting  within  him  the  Divine  Spirit,  is  strongly 
combated  by  J.  Weiss.  He  holds  that,  though  this  was  most 
probably  the  view  of  the  old  tradition,  which  Mark  followed  and 
embodied,  Mark  himself  had  advanced  bej'ond  it.  To  him  Jesus 
was  Son  of  God  from  his  birth,  as  he  was  to  Paul — and  this 
quite  independently  of  any  virgin  birth.  The  oldest  form  of  the 
heavenly  voice  was  probably,  'Thou  art  my  Son,  to-day  I  have 
begotten  thee '  (i.e.  Psalm  ii.  without  Isaiah).  This  is  found  in 
one  important  reading  in  the  story  of  the  baptism  in  Luke. 
This  form  Mark  avoided  in  order  not  to  make  the  Sonship 
begin  at  the  baptism.  What  the  baptism  did  was  to  make  Jesus 
realize  his  Sonship.  He  realizes  that  he  is  the  heavenly  com- 
missioned and  appointed  Messiah,  and  his  earthly  work  has  now 
to  begin.  J.  Weiss  holds  that  both  to  the  Christian  community 
for  whom  and  among  whom  Mark  was  written,  and  to  Mark 
himself, '  the  Christ '  and  '  the  Son  of  God '  are  synonymous  terms; 
cp.  the  various  terms  in  i.  24,  iii.  11,  v.  7,  and  xiv.  61.  It  may 
here  be  noted,  by  the  way,  that  the  more  advanced  the  Christology 
of  Mark  (and  if  Paul's  main  letters  are  genuine  it  can  hardly  have 
fallen  far  short  of  Paul's),  the  more  trustworthy  must  be  the  many 
stories  and  phrases  in  his  Gospel  which  imply  a  purely  human 
conception  of  Jesus,  whether  to  himself  or  to  others. 

Yet  even  to  Mark  the  Son  of  God  meant  something  totally 
different  from  what  later  Christian  dogma  meant  by  it.  It  meant 
something  nearer  to  Jewish  conceptions.  As  Israel  is  God's  son, 
so  the  Messiah,  the  king  of  Israel,  is  God's  son  too.  This  did  not 
mean  that  the  Messiah  was  a  part  of  God,  or  himself  God.  Even 
when  the  Messiah  was  regarded  by  certain  schools  of  Jewish 
thought  as  a  semi-divine  being,  he  was  no  more  God  than  an  angel 
was  God.     Yet  an  angel  may  be  described  as  a  semi-divine  being. 

It  is  important  that  the  words  of  the  voice  are  partly  made 
up  from  Isaiah  xlii.  i.  'The  servant  of  the  Lord'  was  identified 
with  the  Messiah.  And  in  Greek  Trat?,  the  rendering  of  the 
Hebrew  ebed,  means  both  '  servant '  and  '  child.'  If  one  could 
show  that  Jesus  himself  thought  that  he  was  the  'servant,'  and 
that  he  fulfilled  the  servant's  rdle,  if  one  could  show  that  he 
believed  that  the  '  servant '  was  the  true  Messiah  rather  than,  or 
as  well  as,  the  king  predicted  in  Isaiah  xi.  (and  a  far  higher  and 
better  Messiah  too),  or  that  he  accepted  the  one  sort  of  Messiah- 
ship  and  rejected  the  other,  many  difficulties  would  be  solved. 


1. 9-1 1]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  49 

But  in  the  Gospels  Jesus  never  makes  a  really  definite  pronounce- 
ment on  the  matter.  We  do  not  know  whether  he  thought  the 
king  Messiah  of  Isaiah  xi.  a  mistaken  conception  or  not.  If  the 
account  of  his  entry  into  Jerusalem  is  tolerably  accurate,  he  can 
hardly  have  done  so  wholly.  Yet  he  never  alludes  to  Isaiah  xi., 
and  though  to  him  the  Messiah  was  undoubtedly  a  king  in  a 
certain  sense,  he  was  probably  more  and  other  than  the  righteous 
ruler  of  that  famous  chapter.  It  is  impossible  ever  to  know  how 
Jesus  interpreted  the  great  Messianic  utterances  of  the  prophets. 
He  may  likely  enough  have  formed  no  consistent  theory  about  them. 
In  the  Targum  {i.e.  the  Jewish  Aramaic  translation  of  the  Old 
Testament)  Isaiah  xlii.  i  reads :  '  Behold  my  servant,  the  Messiah.' 
And  the  servant  of  Isaiah  lii.  13-liii.  is  also  specifically  called 
the  Messiah.  Yet  the  very  same  writer  who  thought  that  the 
'servant'  was  the  Messiah  probably  also  thought  that  the  king 
of  Isaiah  xi.  was  also  the  Messiah !  In  matters  of  religion  the 
human  consciousness  is  often  unaware  of  the  oddest  inconsistencies. 
The  religious  mind,  guided  mainly  by  feeling  and  aspiration,  makes 
up  its  own  conceptions  and  interpretations ;  it  takes  and  leaves 
and  combines;  exegesis,  consistency,  historic  interpretation,  are 
remote  and  indifferent  to  it. 

Let  me,  however,  attempt  thus  early  to  say  a  few  words  as 
regards  the  vexed  question  of  the  Messianic  consciousness  of  Jesus. 
And  first  as  to  the  character  of  the  problem,  the  sources  for  its 
solution,  and  the  answers  which  have  been  given.  The  only 
material  available  with  which  to  answer  the  question  is  contained 
in  the  three  Synoptic  Gospels.  Yet  here  the  evidence  is  so  small, 
so  fragmentary,  so  dubious,  and  even  so  contradictory,  that  learned 
scholars  have  disputed  over  it  for  generations,  and  dispute  over  it 
still.  Some  think  that  Jesus  did  not  believe  himself  to  be  the 
Messiah ;  others — most  others — that  he  did.  Of  the  second  class, 
some  think  that  he  only  very  gradually  came  to  the  conviction 
that  he  was  the  Messiah ;  others,  that  he  believed  himself  to  be 
so  from  the  beginning  of  his  ministry.  But  even  if  we  neglect 
the  view  that  Jesus  did  not  believe  himself  to  be  the  Messiah, 
even  then  the  doubts  and  divergencies  are  by  no  means  over.  For 
even  supposing  that  he  held  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  what  sort 
of  Messiah  did  he  think  that  he  was  ?  What  was  his  conception 
of  the  Messiah  ?  And  did  that  conception  change  and  modify  in 
the  course  of  his  ministry?  What  was  his  conception  of  the 
Messianic  office,  of  the  work  which  the  Messiah  had  to  do  1  What 
part  had  the  Messiah  to  play  at  the  end  of  the  existing  order 
and  in  ushering  in  the  new  order? 

Now  the  answers  to  these  questions  not  only  are  dependent 
upon,  and  suffer  from,  all  the  uncertainties  due  to  the  fragmentary, 

M.  4 


50  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1.9-" 

dubious,  and  often  legendary  and  miraculous  character  of  the 
Synoptic  material,  but  they  also  suffer  from  a  further  uncertainty, 
which  to  an  uninformed  Jewish  reader  of  the  present  day  is,  at 
first,  surprising. 

The  ordinary  uninformed  Jew  to-day  thinks  of  the  Messiah 
partly  in  terms  of  one  or  two  salient  passages  of  Isaiah,  and 
partly  in  terms  of  late  Jewish  theology.  To  him  the  Messiah 
is  essentially  the  figure  described  in  Isaiah  xi.  A  righteous  ruler, 
purely  human,  who  restores  the  Jews  to  their  own  land  from  their 
exile,  and  inaugurates  a  lasting  reign  upon  earth  of  peace  and 
goodness  and  the  knowledge  of  God.  The  Messiah,  in  fact,  ushers 
in  the  earthly  Kingdom  of  God.  Nothing  is  more  inaccurate  than 
the  assertion  that  the  Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah  is  merely 
material,  and  merely  political,  and  merely  national.  It  is,  doubt- 
less, all  three.  It  involves,  precisely  like  the  new  era  in  the 
Gospels,  a  destruction  of  enemies,  but  its  most  essential  feature  is 
the  coming  of  righteousness  and  peace.  When  the  Messiah  has 
done  his  work,  men  '  shall  beat  their  swords  into  ploughshares  and 
their  spears  into  pruning-hooks ;  nation  shall  not  lift  up  sword 
against  nation,  neither  shall  they  learn  war  any  more.'  When  the 
Messiah  has  done  his  work  God  '  will  turn  to  the  people  a  pure 
language,  that  they  may  call  upon  the  name  of  the  Lord,  to  serve 
him  with  one  consent.'  '  And  the  Lord  shall  be  king  over  all  the 
earth ;  in  that  day  shall  the  Lord  be  One,  and  his  name  One.' 
This  is  what  the  ordinary,  uninformed  Jewish  reader  thinks  of  the 
Messiah  and  of  Messiah's  work  and  its  result. 

But  it  does  not  follow  that  what  the  ordinary  Jewish  reader 
thinks  to-day  is  what  was  thought  by  all  the  contemporaries  of 
Jesus  1900  years  ago.  And  this  is  the  further  uncertainty  alluded 
to  just  now.  We  do  not  exactly  know  what  was  the  prevailing 
conception,  or  what  were  the  various  conceptions,  of  the  Messiah 
and  of  his  office  in  the  days  of  Jesus. 

We  have  some  evidence  which  is  earlier ;  we  have  much 
evidence  which  is  later.  We  have  little  which  is  contemporary. 
But  we  know  from  the  apocalyptic  literature  that  the  old  con- 
ception of  the  Messiah  had  been  modified  considerably.  To  begin 
with,  the  Messiah  was  not  to  all  Jews  of  that  age  so  purely  human, 
so  merely  '  a  man,'  as  he  was  to  the  author  of  Isaiah  xi.,  as  he  is 
to  the  ordinary  Jewish  reader  to-day.  He  had  become  to  some 
circles,  to  some  thinkers,  a  more  or  less  divine  or  supernatural 
being.  He  had,  perhaps,  been  combined  with  other  conceptions, 
as,  for  instance,  it  may  be,  with  the  archetypal  Man,  who  was  not 
mere  man,  but  '  superman,'  pre-existent  and  heavenly.  This  was 
one  change,  and  that  a  great  one. 

Another  was  that,  to  some  thinkers,  the  Messiah  was  not  the 


1. 9-1 1]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  51 

warrior  who  fights  against  Israel's  foes,  and  then  inaugurates  an 
earthly  era  of  righteousness  and  peace.  The  doctrine  of  the 
resurrection  of  the  dead  had  profoundly  modified  and  enlarged  the 
conception  of  the  whole  Messianic  age  Doubtless  Israel  was  still 
to  be  freed  from  its  oppressors;  it  was  to  live  in  its  own  land, 
happy,  triumphant,  prosperous  and  peaceful.  But  the  whole 
denouement  and  transformation,  culminating  in  the  Resurrection 
of  the  Dead  and  the  Last  Judgment,  was  to  be  brought  about  by 
the  more  direct  and  sudden  interposition  and  intervention  of  God. 
The  successful  and  righteous  warrior,  the  virtuous  and  prosperous 
ruler,  made  way,  among  some  groups  and  persons,  for  a  more 
mysterious,  semi-divine,  semi-human  Figure,  who  should  preside 
over  the  rapidly  changing  scenes  of  a  vaster  and  grander  drama. 

Men's  conceptions  of  the  nature  and  office  of  the  Messiah  may 
perhaps,  in  the  age  of  Jesus,  have  ranged  from  the  old  conception 
(which  is  also  the  modern  Jewish  conception)  to  the  other  con- 
ception which  has  just  been  sketched.  Between  the  two  extremes 
there  would  be  room  for  many  combinations  and  degrees,  which 
might  be  held  by  different  persons,  more  or  less  distinctly,  at  the 
same  period.  What,  however,  was  the"  Messianic  conception  in 
Nazareth  and  Capernaum,  what  in  Jericho  and  Jerusalem,  in  the 
age  of  Jesus  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  say  with  precision.  Did 
Galilee  differ  from  Judsea  ?  Do  the  more  supernatural  and  enlarged 
conceptions  of  the  apocalyptic  writers  imply  that  such  conceptions 
were  widely  spread  among  the  common  people,  or  were  they  rather 
the  possession  and  the  dream  of  but  a  few?  Did  the  ordinary 
Rabbi,  the  official  teacher,  as  well  as  the  populace,  ignore  them 
and  pass  them  by  ?  Or  was  the  entire  conception  of  the  Messiah 
little  thought  of  and  little  prominent  in  those  days?  All  these 
questions  are  only  to  be  conjecturally  answered.  Adequate  material 
for  an  adequate  answer  is,  unfortunately,  lacking. 

One  therefore  comes  back  to  the  question,  What  sort  of  Messiah 
did  Jesus  suppose  himself  to  be — if  he  supposed  himself  to  be 
the  Messiah  at  all — with  added  uncertainty.  Still  a  few  points 
emerge.  It  would  seem  that  Jesus  was  affected  to  a  considerable 
extent  by  the  great  developments  of  the  Messianic  conception  to 
which  allusion  has  been  made.  The  dreams  of  the  apocalyptic 
writers  can  hardly  have  escaped  his  notice  entirely.  He  was  not 
unfamiliar  with  them.  Hence  we  may  assume  that  the  Messiah  to 
him  was  something  more  and  other  than  the  Messiah  of  Isaiah  xi. 
He  was  a  being  who  was  to  take  a  leading  part  in  a  greater 
drama.  (Yet  that  greater  drama,  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom, 
with  all  that  this  involved,  including,  perhaps,  the  Final  Judgment, 
at  first  overshadowed  the  personal  or  individual  element.  Jesus 
starts  by  preaching  the  Kingdom;  not  the  Messiah  or  himself.) 

4—2 


52  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1.9-1 1 

God  was  going  to  make  an  end  of  the  old  order :  there  was  no 
need  for  man  to  fight:  the  Roman  dominion  would  presumably 
fall  to  pieces  of  itself,  or  through  divine  agency,  when  the  new 
order  and  the  divine  Kingdom  were  established.  In  this  sense, 
then,  the  Messiah  to  Jesus  was  not  a  '  political '  personage ;  not  a 
warrior ;  not  an  '  earthly '  prince ;  not  a  '  merely  Jewish '  monarch. 
In  this  sense  he  was  to  Jesus  probably  more  like  the  Messiah  of 
apocalyptic  dreamers.  Nor  is  it  improbable  that  many  Rabbis 
and  Pharisees,  who  were  not  apocalyptists,  shared  these  opinions. 
To  many  of  them  it  was  only  God,  and  not  the  Messiah,  who 
would  destroy  the  power  of  Rome. 

But  this  newer  Messiah,  because  a  bigger,  less  purely  human — 
if  you  will,  less  purely  Jewish  personage,  was  not,  therefore, 
necessarily,  more  virtuous,  more  spiritual,  less  prejudiced.  What 
is  Jewish  and  national  may  yet  be  ethical ;  what  is  superhuman 
and  mysterious  may  be  unethical.  To  Isaiah  and  to  those  Jews 
who  thought  on  these  political  and  'national'  lines,  the  Messiah 
meant  the  triumph  of  righteousness  and  the  destruction  of  wicked- 
ness; to  the  apocalyptic  dreamers  he  did  not  mean  anything 
better ;  perhaps  the  stress  upon  righteousness  was,  indeed,  lessened. 
It  is  even  doubtful  whether  the  nationalism  of  the  apocalyptic 
dreamers  was  less  intense  than  the  nationalism  of  those  who 
rejected  these  apocalyptic  visions  and  stuck  to  the  prophets  and 
to  Isaiah  xi.  Wrede  in  his  excellent  essay  on  the  teaching  of 
Jesus  about  the  Kingdom  of  God  is  rather  inclined  to  overestimate 
the  spirituality  of  later  Jewish  teaching  and  to  underestimate  the 
spirituality  of  such  old  passages  as  Isaiah  xL  He  exalts  the 
17th  Psalm  of  Solomon,  for  instance.  It  is  indeed  fine  and 
spiritual,  but  I  hardly  call  it  less  political  or  more  spiritual  than 
Isaiah  xi.  or  ii.  1-4.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  we  have  no  clear 
evidence  that  Jesus  thought  of  the  Kingdom,  and  of  the  Messiah's 
work  in  connection  with  that  Kingdom,  upon  deliberately  unnational 
lines.  There  is  no  clear  evidence  that  he  rejected  the  primacy 
of  Israel,  or  its  continuance  as  a  nation,  in  the  new  order  and  in 
the  Kingdom.  There  is  no  special  advance  to  be  noted  here,  just 
because,  or  as  a  result,  of  the  fact  that,  the  Kingdom  was  to  be 
established  by  direct  divine  intervention,  and  the  Messiah  was 
not  to  be  a  successful  warrior  and  mere  earthly  king.  It  is  not 
here  that  the  advance  of  Jesus,  if  indeed  in  this  province  of 
thought  he  made  an  advance,  can  be  found  to  lie.  But  it  does 
seem  as  if  other  elements  of  his  teaching  and  character  had  their 
reflex  influence  upon  his  conception  of  the  Messiah. 

For  we  may  reasonably  argue  that  Jesus,  as  a  great  and 
original  religious  and  ethical  teacher  and  thinker,  could  hardly 
not  have  allowed  his  religious  and  ethical  views  to  affect  his 


1. 9-II]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  53 

conception  of  the  Messiah.  It  is  not  right  to  call  his  ethical 
doctrine  a  mere  '  Interims-Ethik.'  Righteousness  was  to  be  the 
keynote  of  the  new  Kingdom,  as  well  as  the  passport  of  admission 
within  its  gates.  Like  many  another  religious  teacher,  Jesus  did 
not  ask  himself  the  question  how  far  the  virtues  upon  which  he 
laid  such  great  stress  would  be  needless,  or  incapable  of  being 
realized  and  practised,  in  the  renovated  world.  He  was  keen 
about  them  for  their  own  sake,  apart  from  their  immediate  effects. 
He  did  not  consider  the  difficulty  that  their  effects  would  (partially, 
at  any  rate)  hinder  their  continuance. 

And  among  those  virtues  upon  which  he  laid  stress  may  we 
not  safely  assume  that  the  virtue  of  self-sacrifice,  of  service  for 
the  sake  of  others,  was  undoubtedly  one  ?  Is  it  not  reasonable, 
then,  to  suppose  that  he  looked  upon  his  own  life  as  a  service, 
and  that  this  thought  may  even  have  developed  into  the  idea  that 
he  might  have  to  die  in  order  to  complete  his  service?  Death 
would  not  be  the  end;  death  was  to  no  man  the  end;  certainly 
not  to  the  righteous ;  least  of  all  to  the  Messiah.  Was  the  glory 
and  was  the  triumph  perhaps  only  to  come  after  the  life  of  service 
had  been  ended  by  a  death  of  sacrifice  ?  If  the  principle  of  non- 
resistance  was  adopted  by  him  in  his  ethics  for  daily  life,  it  is  not 
unnatural  that  it  should  have  been  adopted  by  him  as  regards  his 
own  special  life  and  his  position  as  Messiah.  Hence  we  see  how 
it  may  have  come  about  that  his  conception  of  the  Messiah  may 
have  been  modified.  The  Messiah  was  no  more  the  conqueror 
and  the  warrior-prince :  what  destruction  there  was  to  do  would 
be  done  by  God.  The  Messiah  would,  indeed,  rule  in  the  perfected 
Kingdom,  but  this  rule  was  hardly  looked  upon  in  the  ordinary 
way,  and  the  stress  was  not  habitually  laid  upon  it.  The  stress 
was  rather  often  laid  upon  the  Messiah's  work  in  the  present  and 
the  near  future,  a  work  of  service,  even  of  lowly  service,  and  a  work 
which  was,  perhaps,  to  culminate  in  death.  This,  then,  may  have 
been  the  special  development  made  by  Jesus  to  the  conception  of 
the  Messiah ;  and  such  a  view  would  fit  in  with  the  supposition 
that  Jesus  identified  the  Messiah  with  the  mysterious  Man  (Daniel 
vii.  13)  who  was  to  be  sent  by  God  at  the  great  crisis  to  superintend 
the  final  consummation,  and  that  he  believed  that  this  Man  was 
himself — himself  as  he  was  to  be  in  his  glory,  rather  than  himself 
as  he  then  was. 

Renewed  reflection  leads  me  to  think  that  I  may  not  perhaps 
have  sufficiently  allowed  for  the  curiously  negative  attitude  of 
Jesus  towards  national  and  political  questions.  It  remains  true 
that,  as  I  have  said,  there  is  no  clear  evidence  that  Jesus  rejected 
the  primacy  of  Israel,  or  its  continuance  as  a  nation,  in  the  new 
order  and  in  the  Messianic  Kingdom.    One  passage  which  would 


54  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 9-n 

imply  this  may  have  been  written  and  composed  many  years 
after  his  death.  But  it  also  seems  to  be  true,  as  Wrede  well 
puts  it,  that  the  nation  as  such  never  appears  to  interest  him  at 
all.  Instead  of  the  nation  he  is  always  concerned  with  individuals. 
A  man's  qualifications  for  the  Kingdom  are  not  decided  by  birth, 
but  rigidly  and  exclusively  by  character.  'The  hopes  of  Jesus 
were  absolutely  neutral  as  regards  the  opposition  of  Israel  and 
the  Roman  dominion.  Who  would  give  a  thought  to  the  fall  of 
the  Roman  Empire,  when  he  looks  forward  to  the  overturning  of 
heaven  and  earth  ?  It  is  not  as  if  we  found  any  sympathy  with 
the  national  enmity  to  the  Romans.  But  we  find  rather  a  clearly 
expressed  indiiference.  It  is  just  in  this  point  that  Jesus  plainly 
stands  apart  from  the  most  exalted  passages  in  the  Psalms  of 
Solomon.  His  attitude  is  in  extreme  opposition  to  that  of  the 
party  of  the  Zealots.  So  far  is  he  from  revolutionary  thoughts 
that  the  whole  question  seems  to  fail  to  interest  him.     It  is  im- 

f)ossible  too  that  he  should  have  adopted  this  position  only  in  the 
ater  period  of  his  life,  it  was  clear  from  the  beginning  of  his 
career'  (Wrede,  'Die  Predigt  Jesu  vom  Reiche  Gottes'  in  Stvdien 
und  Vortrdgen,  p.  Ii6).  I  have  elsewhere  suggested  that  the 
more  national  aspirations  of  Jesus  may  have  been  neglected  or 
omitted  by  Mark,  but  the  comparatively  early  date  of  this  Gospel 
makes  such  a  supposition  less  easy.  On  the  other  hand  Dalman 
seems  to  go  too  far  when  he  says:  'There  is  no  doubt  that  Jesus 
developed  his  thoughts  about  the  Kingdom  of  God  (or  Rule  of 
God,  as  Dalman  thinks  we  ought  to  call  it,  Gottesherrschaft)  in 
conspicuous  opposition  to  the  Zealots.  According  to  the  "  Give 
unto  Ceesar"  saying,  he  saw  in  the  political  rule  of  the  Romans 
no  diminution  (Beeintrdchtigung)  of  the  Kingdom  of  God.  The 
Rule  of  God  has  not  to  remove  the  rule  of  strangers  over  the 
nation,  but  all  powers  hostile  to  God  within  the  soul  of  man '  {Die 
Worte  Jesu,  I.  p.  113).  This  is  surely  exaggerated.  So  too  it  is 
exaggerated  when  Mr  Gardner  says  that  Jesus's  conception  of  the 
Kingdom  of  the  Messiah  'was  quite  consistent  with  the  maintenance 
of  the  Roman  Empire'  {Growth  of  Christianity,  p.  51).  M.  Loisy 
hits  the  mark  more  nearly  when  he  says  that  though  the  work  of 
Jesus  had  nothing  in  common  with  that  of  a  Judas  Maccabseus, 
yet  'the  chosen  of  the  Kingdom  will  be  dependent  on  no  human 
power;  the  servitude  under  which  Israel  labours  will  be  destroyed  ; 
there  will  remain  no  place  for  the  authority  of  C»sar  in  the  city  of 
God  ;  but  God  Himself,  and  not  man,  will  substitute  His  rule  for 
that  of  men.  In  his  reply  to  the  tribute  question  (Mark  xiL  13-17) 
the  respect  which  Jesus  shows  for  the  constituted  authorities  is 
quite  negative.  He  in  no  wise  intended  to  sanction  the  right  of 
the  Emperor  as  a  principle  of  the  Society  which  was  to  come. 


I.  12,  13]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  55 

The  Emperor  belongs  to  the  providential  order  of  this  world,  like 
Sennacherib  or  Nebuchadnezzar :  he  does  not  belong  to  the 
definitive  order  of  the  Kingdom,  and  his  power  will  fall,  as  is 
befitting,  with  the  power  of  Satan,  of  whom  he  is,  in  certain 
respects,  the  representative'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  231). 

How  far  Jesus  was  influenced  in  his  career  and  thought 
by  the  '  servant '  passages  of  Isaiah  xlii.  and  liii.  it  is  impossible 
to  say.  But  we  may  note  that  the  references  to  the  servant 
passages  seem  to  belong  to  Matthew  and  Luke  rather  than  to 
Mark.  See  Matt.  viii.  17,  xii.  17-21  ;  Luke  iv.  18,  xxii.  37.  The 
idea  of  a  suffering  Messiah  was  not,  so  far  as  we  can  gather, 
suggested  to  Jesus  by  Isaiah  liii.  The  idea,  as  W.  says,  might 
have  been  found  in  that  wonderful  chapter,  'aber  da  wird  sie  in 
den  Evangelien  nicht  gefunden '  (Einleitung,  p.  91,  n.  i).  But 
Dr  Carpenter  says:  'How  far  this  aspect  [i.e.  the  aspect  of  the 
Messiah  as  the  servant]  of  the  Messiah's  work  had  been  realized 
by  popular  imagination  at  the  time  of  Jesus,  it  is  impossible  to 
estimate.  In  the  stream  of  apocalyptic  literature  it  has  no  place 
at  alL  It  is  unconnected  with  the  doctrine  of  the  two  ages ;  it  is 
independent  of  the  royal  line  of  Judah ;  it  seems  on  a  different 
plane  from  the  visions  of  the  New  Jerusalem,  or  the  great  Judgment 
of  the  Son  of  man.  It  lies  altogether  apart  from  the  expectations 
of  those  who  hoped  that  Messiah  would  'restore  the  kingdom  to 
Israel'  (Acts  i.  6).  Yet  its  presence  in  the  Gospels  is  palpable. 
We  may  not  always  be  able  to  accept  as  genuine  the  incidents  or 
sayings  through  which  it  is  expressed.  But  when  we  try  to  trace 
it  back  to  its  source,  shall  we  be  wrong  if  we  ascribe  it,  at  least 
provisionally,  to  Jesus  himself?'  {First  Three  Gospels,  p.  92). 

For  the  Spirit  assuming  the  form  of  a  dove,  see  Additional 
Note  4. 

12,  13.    The  Temptation 
(Cp.  Matt.  iv.  i-ii;  Luke  iv.  1-13) 

12  And  immediately  the  spirit  drove  him  into  the  wilderness. 

13  And  he  was  in  the  wilderness  fortj'  days,  being  tempted  of  Satan ; 
and  he  was  with  the  wild  beasts,  and  the  angels  ministered  unto 
him. 

Though  Mark's  account  may  be  the  older,  it  will  be  better  to 
reserve  what  I  have  to  say  on  the  subject  of  the  temptation  for 
the  notes  on  Matthew.  Harnack  (Spriiche  und  Reden  Jesu, 
p.  137,  English  translation,  p.  195)  thinks  that  Mark  followed  a 
different  version  of  the  temptation  legend  from  that  given  in  Q, 


S6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  12,  13 

the  document  ('Redenquelle')  which  is  embedded  in  Luke  and 
Matthew.  In  it,  perhaps,  Jesus  did  not  fast,  but  was  fed  by  the 
angels.  Both  in  Mark  and  in  Q  the  temptation  is  'Messianic': 
i.e.  it  is  the  temptation  of  the  Messiah,  not  of  an  ordinary  in- 
dividual. The  victory  of  Jesus  over  Satan  is  not  mentioned ;  it  is 
assumed.  'He  was  with  the  wild  beasts.'  The  meaning  is  not 
quite  clear.  This  touch  is  found  in  Mark  only.  The  animals  may 
be  mere  'scaffolding'  as  some  think ;  they  heighten  the  desolate- 
ness  of  the  wilderness.  Cp.  Isaiah  xiii.  2 1 ;  2  Mac.  v.  27.  They 
may  also  be  interpreted  Messianically.  Gp.  Job  v.  23  ;  Ez.  xxxiv. 
25;  Ps.  xc.  13.  The  wild  beasts  cannot  hurt  the  Son  of  God. 
Merx  (11.  2,  p.  11)  says  that  the  temptation  in  Mark  gives  him  the 
impression  of  being  an  excerpt  from  a  larger  account,  an  extract, 
not  a  primary  statement  enlarged  by  others.  It  must  be  confessed 
that  there  is  something  to  be  said  for  this  view.  Loisy  notes  that 
the  narrative,  brief  as  it  is  in  Mark,  has  many  striking  epithets  and 
traits.  He  does  not  think  that  Luke  and  Matthew  merely  enlarged 
Mark's  account,  but  that  all  three  Evangelists  probably  drew  from 
a  common  source,  which  Mark  curtailed  and  partly  changed.  To 
B.  Weiss  the  source  is  Q.  It  is  perhaps  worth  noting,  even  if 
Weiss  makes  too  much  of  it,  that  though,  according  to  Mark  i.  4, 
Jesus  is  already  in  the  'wilderness,'  in  i.  12  he  is,  unnecessarily, 
said  to  be  impelled  into  it.  This  '  Widersinn '  is,  according  to 
Weiss,  explained,  because  in  i.  4  Mark  does  not  depend  on  Q,  but 
puts  forward  his  own  view  of  the  scene  of  the  baptism  in  order  to 
show  the  fulfilment  of  Isaiah  xl.  3;  in  i.  12,  on  the  other  hand, 
Mark  is  quoting  Q,  who  (Matt.  iv.  i)  treats  the  scene  of  the  tempta- 
tion as  in  the  wilderness.  This  is  only  one  small  instance  of  the 
extreme  minuteness  of  Weiss's  method  and  work. 


14,  15.    The  Mission  in  Galilee 
{Gp.  Matt.  iv.  12-17;  Luke  iv.  14,  15) 

14  Now   after   John  was   thrown  into    prison,  Jesus  came  into 

15  Galilee,  and  proclaimed  the  good  tidings  of  God,  saying,  'The 
time  is  fulfilled,  and  the  kingdom  of  God  hath  drawn  nigh;  repent 
ye,  and  believe  in  the  good  tidings.' 

It  is  implied  'that  Jesus  did  not  return  to  Galilee  at  once, 
after  the  baptism  and  the  temptation,  but  that  a  period,  the 
duration  of  which  is  not  defined,  elapsed  before  he  made  this 
journey '  (Menzies).  Jesus  only  began  his  public  ministry  after 
the  imprisonment  of  John.     We  may  assume  that  the  fact  that 


I.  14,  IS]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDINQ  TO  MARK  57 

John  could  not  continue  his  message  impelled  Jesus  to  take  it  up 
and  enlarge  it.  Loisy,  as  we  have  seen,  thinks  that  Jesus  now 
already  had  the  conviction  that  he  was  the  Messiah,  but  few  critical 
theologians  will  agree  with  him  here.  '  It  may  be  supposed  that 
Jesus  made  up  his  mind  to  speak  in  his  turn,  because  the  approach- 
ing Kingdom  was  now  without  a  prophet,  and  because  it  pertained 
to  him,  rather  than  to  anyone  else,  rather  than  to  John  himself,  to 
prepare  men  for  this  coming'  {E.  S.i.  p. 429,  cp. especially  pp.  212, 
213,  403,  435)-. 

'  The  time  is  fulfilled.'  Whether  Jesus  used  these  exact  words 
or  no,  there  is  no  reason  to  doubt  that  their  sentiment  was  his. 
For  '  the  whole  activity  of  Jesus  can  ouly  be  understood  from  his 
conviction  that  the  time  of  preparation  {die  Frist)  which  God  had 
appointed  to  the  world  was  now  at  an  end '  (J.  Weiss). 

'Believe  in  the  good  tidings  or  gospel.'  For  W.'s  view  of 
these  words  see  note  on  i.  i .  If  he  is  right,  Jesus  could  not  have 
used  the  phrase.  The  words  can,  however,  also  be,  and  have  been, 
interpreted  to  mean,  'believe  in  the  good  news  that  the  Kingdom 
of  God  is  at  hand.'  The  words  are  omitted  in  Matthew.  Some ' 
find,  both  in  them  and  in  the  phrase  'the  time  is  fulfilled,'  the 
influence  of  Paul.  Moreover,  'repent,  and  believe  in  the  good 
tidings,'  though  by  no  means  an  inconsistent,  would  be  an  unusual, 
combination.  'Repent,  for  wrath  is  at  hand,'  is  what  one  expects. 
If  that  is  what  Jesus  said,  he  began  like  John  and  like  Amos. 
'The  day  of  the  Lord  is  at  hand.'  'The  day'  implies  a  judgment. 
Men  must  repent  in  order  to  avoid  condemnation  and  to  secure 
the  good  time  which  is  to  follow.  Jesus  says:  'The  Messianic  era, 
the  Kingdom  of  God,  is  at  hand.  To  enjoy  its  fruits,  to  escape 
its  terrors,  repent.  So  only  can  ye  enter  it.'  (For  the  Rabbinic 
doctrine  of  'the  Kingdom,'  see  Additional  Note  5.) 

In  Matthew  the  wording  of  Jesus's  message  is  simpler,  and 
this  is  one  of  the  cases  where  Matthew  seems  to  have  preserved 
an  earlier  and  more  authentic  form  of  the  words  of  Jesus  than 
Mark  (Matt.  iv.  17,  'Repent  ye,  for  the  Kingdom  of  heaven  is  at 
hand ').  Matthew  expresses  the  purport  of  Jesus's  teaching  in 
terms  '  plus  satisfaisants  que  ceux  de  Marc  et  qui  pourraient  ainsi 
venir  du  recueil  de  sentences'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  122).  Dr  Carpenter 
says  of  Mark's  elaboration :  'The  fulfilment  of  the  appointed  time 
carries  us  into  the  thought  of  the  apostle  Paul,  cp.  Gal.  iv.  4; 
and  the  use  of  the  term  "the  gospel"  as  a  summary  of  the 
teachings  of  Jesus,  coupled  with  the  demand  for  faith — not  in 
God  (xi.  22)  but  in  it — warns  us  that  we  have  here  the  language 
of  the  apostolic  age.'  (Op.  the  addition  of  'the  gospel'  in 
Mark  viii.  35  as  contrasted  with  Matt.  xvi.  25,  and  in  Mark 
X.  29  as  contrasted  with  Matt.  xix.  29.)    (First  Three  Gospels, 


S8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  14,  15 

p.  209.)  The  message  which  Jesus,  like  John,  spoke  at  first  was 
not  a  good  tidings,  not  a  gospel.  It  was  a  message  of  doom  for 
the  unrepentant,  of  solemnity  for  all.  Apparently  people  were 
forgetting  that  the  Great  Day  of  the  Lord  was  not  merely  a 
day  on  which  Israel's  enemies  were  to  be  punished  or  destroyed. 
From  the  prophetic  point  of  view  it  was  a  day  in  which  the  sinners 
in  Israel  should  also  be  punished.  Only  after  Jesus  had  passed 
away  could  the  saying  'Repent'  be  regarded  as  a  good  tidings.  It 
then  came  to  mean:  'believe  in  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  join  the 
Christian  community.'  This  could  be  pretty  easily  done.  Hence 
in  such  circumstances  'repent,  for  the  day  of  the  Lord  is  at  hand,' 
became  a  tidings  not  of  severity,  but  of  gladness. 

Thus  it  would  seem  that  the  earliest  message  of  Jesus  was  on 
old,  familiar  lines.  But  he  does  not  say  that  the  Messiah  has 
come,  or  that  he  himself  is  the  Messiah.  Why  this  reserve  ?  By 
far  the  most  reasonable  view  is  that  he  had  not  as  yet  come  to 
think  that  he  was  the  Messiah.  This  explanation  is,  however, 
strongly  condemned  by  Loisy,  who  takes  quite  a  different  line, 
'As  for  the  reticence  of  Jesus  about  his  Messianic  character,  it  is 
the  result  of  the  fact  that  this  character  was  not  part  of  the 
subject  matter  of  the  gospel ;  the  object  of  the  good  news  was  the 
near  coming  of  the  Kingdom,  and  the  person  of  the  Christ  does  not 
become  essential  to  the  Kingdom  and  cannot  even  be  manifested 
in  its  true  character  except  at  the  coming;  in  a  certain  sense 
Jesus  was  called  to  become  Messiah  and  was  not  yet  Messiah, 
because  the  Messiah,  in  the  ordinary  acceptation  of  the  term,  was 
the  prince  of  the  great  Coming:  it  pertained  to  the  Father  to 
himself  declare  his  Christ,  and  therein  no  doubt  lies  the  principal 
motive  which  caused  Jesus  to  behave  as  the  herald  of  the  Kingdom 
which  was  coming,  without  taking  advantage  of  a  title  which 
would  not  have  its  full  significance  till  the  Kingdom  had  actually 
come.  The  Synoptic  Gospels  do  not  contain  the  least  sign  of  any 
variation  in  Christ's  consciousness  of  his  vocation,  and  the  surprise 
which  has  been  felt  at  not  finding  a  greater  number  of  explicit 
assertions  on  this  subject  in  his  discourses  is  perhaps  due  to  a 
failure  to  understand  the  historical  conditions  of  his  ministry' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  435,  cp.  p.  213).  However  this  may  be,  the  real  greatness 
of  Jesus  consisted  in  that  side  of  his  teaching  which  was  indepen- 
dent of  these  old  watchwords  and  battle-cries.  Though  the  more 
original  and  beautiful  parts  of  his  teaching  are,  as  it  were,  set  in 
the  framework  of  the  conception  of  the  coming  Messianic  era,  and 
were  partly  produced  by  this  dominant  idea,  they  are  yet  in- 
dependent of  the  framework,  and  they  can  be  detached  from  it 
and  can  survive  it. 

Doubtless  the  teaching  of  Jesus  is  partly  to  be  estimated  and 


I.  14,  IS]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  59 

described  by  whatever  conclusions  we  come  to  about  his  view  of 
his  Messiahship  and  office.  Yet  it  is  an  important  fact,  and  one 
of  which  we  must  take  adequate  note,  that  there  is  a  good  deal  of 
his  religious  and  ethical  teaching  which  was  not  directly  related 
to  or  dependent  upon  any  eschatological  conceptions,  any  belief  in 
the  nearing  end  of  the  world.  Or,  if  this  goes  too  far,  it  is 
at  least  right  to  urge  that  there  is  a  good  deal  in  his  finest 
religious  and  ethical  teaching  which  can  survive  such  conceptions 
and  be  easily  detached  from  them.  For  example,  the  'inwardness' 
of  his  teaching,  his  spiritualisation,  or  screwing  up  the  standard, 
of  human  righteousness  and  human  religion.  His  estimate  of  cere- 
monial observances  and  ritual  uncleanness.  His  heroic  paradoxes 
concerning  the  love  of  one's  enemies.  His  looking  at  morality 
and  religion  in  the  light  of  a  few  great  illuminating  and  unifying 
principles,  such  as  the  love  of  God  and  the  love  of  man.  His 
doctrine  of  a  needful  childlike  attitude  of  mind;  his  doctrine  of 
faith.  His  attack  upon  certain  aspects  of  the  doctrine  of  pro- 
portionate retribution  and  reward.  His  insistence  upon  eager 
service,  upon  lowliness  in  service,  and  upon  the  nature  of  true 
greatness  or  superiority.  His  doctrine  of  actively  seeking  out  the 
sinner  and  the  outcast  in  order  to  redeem  them.  His  doctrine 
of  self-sacrifice.  Here  are  large  and  important  teachings,  either 
quite  independent  of,  or  easily  detachable  from,  any  eschatological 
opinions. 

A  certain  difficulty  has  been  pointed  out  by  Brandt  ('  Jezus  en 
de  messiaansche  verwachting,'  in  Teyler's  Theologisch  Tijdschrift, 
1^7,  pp.  461-518;  a  very  suggestive  and  interesting  article).  A 
teaching  Messiah  was  not,  says  Brandt,  in  accordance  with  Jewish 
conceptions  of  him.  Moreover  he  who  believes  that  the  Day  of 
Doom  and  Change  is  soon  at  hand  will  not  give  general  moral 
teaching.  For  these  reasons  Brandt  supposes  that  most  of  the 
teaching  of  Jesus  which  we  find  recorded  in  the  Gospels  was,  where 
genuine,  not  only  given  before  Jesus  believed  that  he  was  the 
Messiah,  but  also  before  he  accepted  the  opinion  of  John  that  the 
Great  Day  was  soon  at  hand.  This  would  imply  a  teaching  period 
before  the  baptism,  and  before  the  announcement  with  which  his 
public  career  is  made  to  start:  'Repent  for  the  time  is  fulfilled 
and  the  Kingdom  is  at  hand.'  But  though  we  may  avoid  some 
difficulties  by  this  hypothesis,  it  seems  too  venturesome  and  too 
unsupported. 

A  good  deal  of  controversy  still  continues  as  to  the  sense  or 
senses  in  which  Jesus  used  the  expression  the  Kingdom  of  God. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  he  often  meant  by  it  the  new  era,  the 
Messianic  age,  the  earth  as  it  would  be  when  ruled  wholly  by  God 
and  responsive  to  his  rule.     The  Kingdom  of  God  would  exist 


6o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 14, 15 

upon  earth  when  the  dominion  of  Satan  was  wholly  destroyed, 
or  when  sin  and  iniquity  were  no  more.  This  Kingdom  was 
future,  but  at  the  same  time  it  was  near  at  hand.  Only  those 
who,  on  the  one  hand,  made  the  utmost  sacrifices  in  the  right 
spirit  would  enter  the  Kingdom.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
Kingdom  would  come  as  a  gift.  It  would  be  given  as  a  gift  to 
those  who  were  by  nature  and  grace  fitted  to  receive  it.  The 
childlike  in  heart  alone  could  enter  the  Kingdom.  So  far  all  is 
pretty  clear  and  pretty  uncontestable.  But  some  think  that  Jesus 
did  not  only  use  the  phrase  in  this  single  sense,  (i)  The  Kingdom 
is  not,  apparently,  on  all  occasions  to  be  located  upon  earth.  It  is, 
apparently,  also  used  as  a  synonym  for  what  we  call  'heaven':  i.e. 
Jesus  sometimes  speaks  as  a  modern  preacher  might,  who  tells  us 
that  when  the  'righteous'  and  the  'elect'  die,  they  enter  upon  a 
heavenly  life,  the  real  and  true  life  of  the  soul.  The  Kingdom 
seems  sometimes  to  mean  this  heavenly  life.  (2)  The  Kingdom  is 
also  sometimes,  but  rarely,  said  or  implied  to  be  already  present 
This  may  have  several  meanings,  of  which  one  is  easy,  the  others 
more  hard.  The  easy  meaning  (a)  is  that  the  Kingdom  has 
practically  begun  with  the  appearance  and  preaching  of  Jesus. 
The  decisive  moments  are  near  at  hand.  J.  Weiss  says  that  under 
these  circumstances  it  was  as  natural  for  Jesus  sometimes  to  say 
the  Kingdom  is  already  present,  and  has  begun,  and  sometimes  to 
say  the  Kingdom  will  come,  as  it  is  natural  for  us  when  dark 
clouds  are  rolling  up  and  the  lightning  flashes  on  the  horizon  to 
say  either  'a  storm  is  coming'  or  'there  is  a  storm.'  But  (b)  the 
Kingdom  as  present  seems  also  to  be  used  in  other  senses  still.  For 

(a)  it  seems  sometimes  to  be  considered  as  a  process, 
which  would  not  come  suddenly  by  divine  interposition,  but 
gradually  by  the  inward  working  and  ferment  of  the  teaching 
of  Jesus  upon  and  within  the  hearts  of  men.     And  again, 

(/3)  it  seems  sometimes  to  be  used  in  an  ideal  way  of  the 
true  disciples  or  of  the  true  Church,  as  if  the  company  of 
those  who  had  the  right  faith  in  God  and  in  the  tidings  did 
actually  constitute  the  Kingdom  in  its  present,  though  not 
completed,  realization. 

But  (7)  it  seems  also  to  be  used  as  if  the  Kingdom 
were  what  Dr  Carpenter  calls  a  'spiritual  fact,'  'a  symbol  of 
living  spiritual  relations,'  as  a  principle  living  and  working 
in  the  hearts  of  men,  as  if  it  were  something  not  visible 
or  concrete,  not  to  be  realized  by  a  divine  revolution,  no 
Kingdom  to  be  created  upon  a  regenerate  earth,  but  some- 
thing invisible,  spiritual,  and  inward.  You  enter  this 
Kingdom,  only  in  so  far  as  this  Kingdom  enters  you.    If 


I.  16-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  6 1 

you  are  spiritual,  'righteous'  in  the  higher  and  newer  sense, 
then  you  are  already  in  the  Kingdom,  for  the  Kingdom  is 
in  you,  and  so  far  as  the  Kingdom  has  a  collective  significa- 
tion, it  is  made  up  of  those  spiritual  men  and  women  in 
whose  souls  the  Kingdom  already  is. 

In  which  sense  the  Kingdom  is  used,  and  whether  it  is 

really  ever  definitely  used  in  any  of  the  last  three  senses, 

must  be   determined  on  each  particular  occasion  by   the 

context  and  meaning  of  each  individual  passage.     We  shall 

often  have  occasion  to  refer  to  the  question  again. 

Meanwhile  it  may  be  said  that  it  seems  most  probable  that 

for  both  the  historic  Jesus  and  the  Jesus  of  Mark  the  Kingdom 

had  nearly  always,  at  bottom,  its  eschatological  signification.     It 

is  the  Messianic  Kingdom  of  the  near  future.     In  Matthew  the 

Kingdom  in  the  sense  of  the  Church  as  already  existent,  the 

fellowship  of  believers,  comes  also  to  the  fore.    How  far  it  is  ever  a 

'  process '  or  an  '  inward  spiritual  fact '  is  very  much  more  doubtful. 


16-20.    The  Call  of  Simon,  Andrew,  James,  and  John 
(Op.  Matt.  iv.  18-22;  Luke  v.  i-ii) 

16  Now  as  he  walked  along  the  lake  of  Galilee,  he  saw  Simon 
and  Andrew  his  brother  casting  a  net  into  the  lake :   for  they 

17  were  fishermen.     And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  Come  ye  after  me, 

18  and  I  will  make  you  become  fishers  of  men.'     And  straightway 

19  they  left  their  nets,  and  followed  him.  And  when  he  had  gone  a 
little  further,  he  saw  James  the  son  of  Zebedee,  and  John  his 

20  brother,  who  were  also  in  a  boat,  mending  their  nets.  And 
straightway  he  called  them :  and  they  left  their  father  Zebedee 
in  the  boat  with  the  hired  servants,  and  went  after  him. 

On  returning  to  Galilee,  Jesus  either  did  not  go  back  to  his 
own  home  in  Nazareth,  or  he  went  there  first  and  then  went  on 
to  Capernaum.  (So  Matthew.)  His  doings  at  or  near  Capernaum 
occupy  Mark  i.  i6-vi.  13,  and  form,  in  W.'s  division  of  Mark,  its 
first  part.     Chapter  i.  I-IS  forms  the  introdaction. 

Mark  gives  us  no  real  biography  of  Jesus ;  what  we  find  is  a 
Series  of  tales  and  sayings  only  partially  arranged  from  a  chrono- 
logical point  of  view.  The  first  thing  he  could  discover  about 
Jesus's  missionary  career  in  Galilee  was  the  call  of  the  four  chief  or 
earliest  apostles.  Of  the  effect  of  the  general  proclamation  given 
in  i.  14,  15,  he  tells  us  nothing.     In  fact,  it  seems  to  be  forgotten. 


62  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  16-20 

or  to  have  no  definite  result.  The  reputation  which  Jesus  acquires 
in  Galilee  (i.  28)  seems  to  rest  on  different  grounds.  But  directly 
one  begins  to  read  the  Gospel  one  enters  on  a  land  of  half-lights 
and  shadows,  a  land  of  puzzles  and  problems,  though  also  a  land  of 
beauty  and  distinction. 

17.  'Fishers  of  men.'  Here  the  individualistic  side  of  the 
mission  of  Jesus  is  indicated.  He  seeks  to  convert  and  save, 
some  here  and  some  there.  He  would  be  a  shepherd  of  souls  and 
bring  them  into  the  Kingdom.  Whether  these  four  men  were 
really  'called'  by  Jesus  in  this  particularly  dramatic  way  is 
another  matter.  It  may  have  been  less  sudden  and  absolute. 
But  that  there  was  a  call,  and  even  that  the  story  goes  back  to 
Peter's  own  recollections  and  statements,  many  commentators 
and  critics  believe.  To  Mark,  the  Messiah's  call  could  only  have 
seemed  absolute,  imperative  and  complete.  By  the  men  called, 
Jesus  was  not  acknowledged  or  recognized  as  the  Messiah,  but  as 
a  teacher,  or  (at  most)  as  a  prophet.  Cp.  the  sceptical  remarks  of 
Briickner  in  the  Zeitschrift  fur  neutestamentliche  Wissensckafi, 
1907,  p.  56.  The  story,  he  thinks,  is  not  history,  but  allegoric 
poetry.  The  call  of  Elisha  is  its  ultimate  basis.  Loisy  admits  the 
influence  of  Elisha  upon  the  redaction,  but  thinks  the  sudden  call 
is  likely  enough.  The  idea  of  the  Kingdom  was  not  new;  the 
apparition  of  an  inspired  preacher  was  not  disconcerting;  Jesus 
may  have  won  them  over  in  a  few  moments  by  the  charm  and 
authority  of  his  words  {E.  S.  I.  p.  437).  But  their  abandonment  of 
their  nets  and  boats  was  less  absolute  than  the  EvangeUst  would 
have  us  believe.  Luke  avoids  the  difficulty  of  the  abruptness. 
He  places  the  call  after  Jesus's  entry  into  Capernaum,  and  indeed 
after  he  had  already  taught  a  little  while  and  had  become  known, 
among  others,  to  Simon.  Merx,  on  the  basis  of  a  minute  critical 
investigation  of  the  text  of  Mark,  thinks  that  this  order  is  original. 

W.  is  generally  dubious  about  the  Petrine  reminiscences.  '  Is 
Peter  to  be  the  warrant  for  the  sudden  calling  of  the  four  fisher- 
men ?  Is  it  supposed  that  he  witnessed  the  walking  on  the  sea  or 
the  going  out  of  the  evil  spirits  into  the  swine,  the  healing  of  the 
woman  with  an  issue  of  blood  through  the  power  of  a  garment,  of 
the  dumb  man  and  the  blind  man  by  spitting  ?  And  why  are  there 
not  more  reports  and  more  trustworthy  reports  about  the  inter- 
course of  the  master  with  his  disciples  ?  It  rather  appears  that 
it  was  not  specially  by  those  who  were  intimate  with  Jesus 
that  the  stories  as  we  find  them  in  Mark  were  handed  down' 
(Wellhausen,  Einleitung,  p.  52). 


L  21-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDING  TO  MARK  63 


21-28.    Jesus  in  the  Synagogue  at  Capernaum — 
The  Unclean  Spirit 

{Cp.  Luke  iv.  31-37) 

21  And   they  went   into   Capernaum ;    and  straightway  on  the 

22  sahbath  day  he  entered  into  the  synagogue,  and  taught.  And 
they  were  amazed  at  his  teaching,  for  he  taught  them  as  one 
having  authority,  and  not  as  the  scribes. 

23  And  straightway  there  was  in  their  synagogue  a  man  with 

24  an  unclean  spirit ;  and  he  cried  out,  saying,  '  What  have  we  to 
do  with  thee,  Jesus  of  Nazareth  ?  art  thou  come  to  destroy  us  ? 

25  I  know  thee  who  thou  art,  the  Holy  One  of  God.'     And  Jesus 

26  rebuked  it,  saying,  'Hold  thy  peace,  and  come  out  of  him.'  And 
the  unclean  spirit  tore  him,  and  cried  with  a  loud  voice,  and  came 

27  out  of  him.  And  they  all  marvelled,  so  that  they  discussed  among 
themselves,  saying,  'What  is  this?  a  new  teaching  with  authority! 

28  And  he  commands  the  unclean  spirits,  and  they  obey  him!'  And 
immediately  his  fame  spread  abroad  throughout  all  the  region  of 
Galilee. 

21.  Mark's  favourite  'straightway'  causes  difficulty.  One 
way  out  is  to  suppose  it  means  'on  the  first  Sabbath  after  the 
fishing.'  More  probably  the  two  sections  are  not  nearly  so  closely 
connected  in  time. 

The  Sinaitic  Syriac  (which  may  be  referred  to,  for  short,  as 
S.S.)  omits  the  evdw  both  here  and  in  23.  It  also  omits  'and 
they  went  into  Capernaum.'  Is  this  original  or  secondary  ?  Merx 
after  an  elaborate  examination  of  the  textual  evidence  says  that 
the  evdv<;  is  interpolated.  Moreover  he  says  that  roi?  ad^^acriv 
means  '  on  Sabbaths '  (in  the  plural). 

On  the  freedom  of  teaching  in  the  synagogues  at  that  time, 
see  Additional  Note  6. 

22.  'As  one  having  authority.'  This  famous  phrase  also 
occurs  (borrowed  from  Mark)  at  the  end  of  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount,  Matt.  vii.  29.  Gp.  Luke  iv.  32.  'He  was  without  out- 
ward authority,  while  the  Scribes  were  the  acknowledged  teachers 
of  the  nation ;  and  yet  the  impression  which  his  teaching  made, 
and  theirs  failed  to  make,  was  that  of  authority '  (Gould). 

His  teaching  is  original.     It  was  not  deduced  from  passages  in 


64  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 21-28 

the  Law.  It  did  not  refer  to  the  sayings  of  older  teachers.  It 
seemed  charged  with  power.  It  was  independent.  There  seemed 
nothing  between  it  and  God,  by  whom  it  was  inspired.  In  this  it 
resembled  the  teaching  of  the  prophets,  and  seemed  different  from 
the  method  and  form  of  the  teaching  of  the  ordinary  Rabbi,  just 
as  it  was  often  very  different  in  matter.  So  we  may  draw  out 
the  meaning  of  the  phrase  with  tolerable  accuracy.  See,  however. 
Additional  Note  6.  The  main  connotation  of  'authority'  to 
the  Evangelist  seems  to  be  that  of  inspiration.  Jesus  seemed  as 
one  possessed  of  the  divine  Spirit.  Gp.  Bergmann,  Jiidische 
Apologetik  im  neutestamentlichen  Zeitalter,  p.  33,  n.  3.  More 
specifically,  the  phrase  (a5s  e^ovaiav  ex^ov)  has  been  held  to  refer  to 
his  Messianic  authority.  C'p.  the  use  of  the  word  'authority'  in 
xi.  28. 

23.  Mark  gives  no  rhumi,  or  contents,  of  Jesu.s's  teaching. 
He  merely  describes  it  in  general  terms.  He  now  proceeds  to 
illustrate  at  much  greater  length  (for  the  miracles  prove  the 
Messiahship  rather  than  the  teaching)  the  other  side  of  Jesus's 
activity — his  expulsion  of  demons  and  his  healings.  This  takes 
him  to  ii.  12. 

To  Mark,  Jesus  was  the  Messiah.  That  he  was  the  Messiah 
was  known,  to  himself  at  least,  from  his  baptism.  It  must  also 
have  been  known  to  supernatural  powers  all  along.  Hence  the 
demons  must  have  recognized  him  for  what  he  was.  They  recog- 
nized their  master,  the  Being  who  was  to  put  an  end  to  their  rule. 

On  the  other  hand,  Mark  has  a  tradition  (which  we  may 
assume  to  be  in  accordance  with  actual  history)  that  Jesus  did 
not  openly  claim  to  be  the  Messiah  till  later  in  his  career.  Hence 
the  demons  must  have  been  told  to  hold  their  tongues  upon  the 
subject.  The  Messiahship  was  proved  by  the  wonders  Jesus 
performed;  it  was  stupid,  hardhearted,  obtuse,  of  people  and  of 
disciples  not  to  understand  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah ;  and  yet 
it  was  intended  that  they  were  not  for  some  while  to  recognize  his 
Messiahship. 

Thus  Mark  is  involved  in  contradictions.  The  Messiah  is,  and 
is  not,  recognized.  He  should,  and  he  should  not,  be  acknowledged. 
His  Messiahship  is  constantly  revealing  itself  and  as  constantly 
ignored — both  by  wicked  opponents  and  even  by  dull  disciples. 
How  much  theology  and  how  little  history  there  must  be  in  all 
this  is  very  apparent. 

24.  The  demon  in  the  man  speaks  in  the  name  of  his  class. 
Hence  his  use  of  the  plural  '  we.'  '  The  Holy  One  of  God '  the 
demon  calls  Jesus — i.e.  the  Messiah.     Israel  is  also  the  Holy  One 


1. 21-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  65 

of  God,  just  as  he  is  God's  Son.  The  epithets  of  Israel  were 
transferred  to  the  Messiah.  But  this,  with  the  parallel  in  Luke 
iv.  34,  is  the  only  place  in  the  Synoptics  where  Jesus,  or  the 
Messiah,  is  called  the  Holy  One  of  God.  For  the  demonology  of 
the  age,  see  Jewish  Encyclopcedia,  'Demonology,'  and  Conybeare, 
'  Christian  Demonology,'  in  J.  Q.  R.  Vol.  viii.  576-608 ;  ix.  59-1 14, 
444-4;o,  581-603. 

25.  Jesus  bids  the  demon  be  silent.  He  does  not  wish  his 
secret  to  be  betrayed.  Originally,  as  W.  says,  the  shrieking  of  the 
demon  was  a  mere  shriek.  If  Jesus  said,  '  Be  still,'  this  may  have 
meant,  'Cease  to  rage,  and  leave  the  sufferer.'  Doubtless  Jesus 
himself  believed  that  the  cause  of  epilepsy  and  other  nervous 
disorders  was  demoniac  possession.  The  shrieking  cries  were 
afterwards  in  some  cases  supposed  to  have  been  intelligible  words, 
or  to  have  included  them.  "The  origin  of  such  a  tale  as  that  here 
given  may  lie  in  the  facts  that 

(a)  Jesus  did  sometimes  order  the  patient  (to  his  mind, 
the  demon)  to  be  quiet ; 

(b)  He  may  sometimes  (though  hardly  when,  as  in  this 
case,  the  cure  took  place  in  a  synagogue)  have  urged  the 
cured  man  not  to  spread  abroad  the  news  of  his  cure,  in 
order  that  he  might  not  be  besieged  and  importuned  by  an 
inordinate  number  of  patients. 

I  feel  rather  doubtful  about  (b).  First  of  all,  it  was  very 
unlikely  in  the  loquacious  East  that  such  a  command  would  for 
a  moment  be  observed ;  it  was  so  unlikely,  that  Jesus  could  hardly 
have  thought  it  worth  while  to  give  it.  Secondly,  as  one  of  the 
objects  of  his  mission  was  to  heal  the  afflicted,  why  should  he  have 
wished  to  hide  his  powers  under  a  bushel  ?  I  think  it  more  likely 
that  all  the  orders  about  silence  are  due  to  theorising.  Even 
though  silence  is  ordered,  the  report  of  the  marvels  wrought 
spreads  more  and  more !  It  may  be  noted,  moreover,  that  this 
miracle,  like  many  others,  is  wrought  quite  openly  before  a  large 
number  of  persons. 

That  Jesus  worked  many  great  cures  can  hardly  be  doubted. 
Whether  many  of  his  cures  relapsed  we  are,  of  course,  not  told. 
We  must  always  remember  that  we  are  dealing  with  a  biography — 
if  we  can  call  it  so — of  unmixed  eulogy.  Only  light  is  allowed  to 
fall  upon  the  hero.  Allowance  must  be  made  for  exaggeration: 
as  the  opponents  are  drawn  too  black,  so  Jesus  himself  is  perhaps 
drawn  too  white.  The  lineaments  of  the  true  historic  Jesus  can 
never  be  fully  known.  We  only  hear  of  the  last  year  of  his  life, 
and  that  is  set  in  a  golden  glow,  a  haze  of  pious  adoration  and 
glory. 

M.  5 


66  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 21-28 

The  limits  of  the  influence  of  a  pious  and  lofty  mind  upon 
certain  kinds  of  diseases  and  nervous  disorders  are,  I  suppose, 
scarcely  to  be  fixed.  For  the  Rabbinic  cures  of  this  kind,  see 
Additional  Note  7, 

It  has  been  rightly  pointed  out  that  the  healings  wrought  by 
Jesus  were  the  outflow  of  his  pity.  He  cared  not  only  for  the 
soul,  but  also  for  the  body.  He  was  better  and  greater  than  a 
mere  exorcist.  The  diseased  people  whom  he  sought  to  help 
were  doubly  and  trebly  objects  of  his  pity,  (i)  They  were  in 
themselves  miserable  or  unhappy.  (2)  Many  were  more  or  less 
regarded  as  outcasts,  smitten  by  the  hand  of  God.  (3)  Some  were 
'  possessed '  by  demons ;  i.e.  sick  spiritually  as  well  as  bodily.  He 
did  not  merely  want  to  show  his  power;  he  pitied,  and  yearned 
to  heal. 

Loisy  has  a  freah  explanation  of  the  outcry  of  the  'demon' 
and  of  Jesus'  rebuke.  The  theme  of  Jesus'  discourse  was  the 
Kingdom,  and  he  would  without  doubt  mention  the  coming 
defeat  of  Satan  and  his  satellites.  The  man  who  thought  him- 
self possessed  of  a  demon  would  have  become  excited ;  he  sees  in 
the  conqueror  of  Satan  his  own  conqueror,  and  hence  cries  out 
against  Jesus,  whose  name  has  been  mentioned  to  him.  Jesus  is 
not  astonished  at  this.  For  he  believes  himself  to  be  the  pre- 
destined vanquisher  of  Satan,  so  he  has  no  hesitation  in  issuing 
orders  to  the  demon,  whose  master  he  is  also  to  overcome.  He 
bids  the  demon  be  silent  and  leave  his  victim  (E.  S.  I.  p.  450). 
This  explanation  does  not  impress  me  as  very  likely. 

The  belief  in  demons  who  dwell  in  man  and  exercise  a 
malignant  activity  from  within  him  was  then  quite  general ;  it 
was  far  more  widely  prevalent  than  in  the  older  period.  The 
prophets  seem  quite  free  from  this  belief.  In  this  respect  they 
were  more  '  modern '  than  Jesus. 

In  his  interesting  pamphlet,  Mehr  Licht,  F.  Delitzsch  has 
broached  the  theory  that  demoniac  possession  and  exorcisms  are 
(so  far  as  the  Jews  are  concerned)  of  Babylonian  origin.  It  is  a 
distinction  {ein  Ruhm)  of  old  Israelite  religion  that  it  is  free  from 
a  belief  in  demons.  The  doctrine  of  devils  or  demons  was  in- 
troduced partly  in  the  Exile,  and  partly  by  the  foreign  colonists 
from  Babylonian  cities  who  were  settled  in  Galilee  and  Samaria 
in  the  eighth  and  seventh  centuries  B.C.  '  Auf  diese  Weise  erklart 
sich  tiberraschend,  warum  gerade  in  der  Vorstellungswelt  Jesu 
von  Nazareth  und  seiner  galilaischen  Schiller  der  Damonen-  und 
Teufelglaube  solche  Bedeutung  gewonnen  hat'  (p.  52). 

27.  The  reading  and  punctuation  are  rather  doubtful.  One 
can  render  as  the  Revised  Version,  or  perhaps  better:  'a  new 


I.  29-34]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  67 

teaching  with  authority.'  In  that  case  the  exclamation  takes  up 
■what  was  said  in  22,  and  adds  on  to  it  the  impression  produced  by 
the  wonderful  exorcism. 

To  J.  Weiss,  who  presses  with  excessive  emphasis  the  theory 
that  many  of  Mark's  narratives  are  direct  reproductions  of  stories 
told  him  by  Peter,  the  eye-witness  (as  to  the  value  of  this  theory 
Schmiedel's  article  '  Gospels '  in  the  Encycloprndia  Bihlica  is  worth 
consulting),  there  must  be  a  great  deal  of  historic  truth  in  the 
details  of  the  incident  of  the  man  with  the  unclean  spirit.  To 
squeeze  this  truth  out,  or  to  force  it  in,  he  has  to  assume 

(a)  That  Jesus  had  just  spoken  of  the  coming  Kingdom 
of  God  and  of  the  end  of  the  kingdom  of  Satan. 

(6)  That  the  sick  man  inferred  from  this  that  Jesus 
himself  was  the  Messiah. 

(c)  That  Jesus  was  annoyed  that  the  lips  of  a  'possessed' 
man  should  have  proclaimed  the  secret  of  his  soul,  of  which 
he  had  as  yet  spoken  to  no  one. 

But  what  a  number  of  assumptions  have  we  here,  and  what 
dubious  ones !  Jesus  has  already  to  think  himself  the  Messiah. 
His  Messiahship  is  announced  by  the  sick  man,  yet  nobody  pays 
any  attention.  Is  it  not  safer  to  believe  that,  though  Jesus  may 
early  in  his  career  have  healed  a  sick  man  in  the  synagogue  at 
Capernaum,  the  words  in  24  and  25  are  apocryphal?  But  if  we 
can  put  no  trust  in  the  accuracy  of  this  '  Petrine '  reminiscence, 
must  we  not  be  somewhat  sceptical  as  to  the  accuracy  of  any  other  ? 


29-34.    The  Mothee-in-Law  of  Simon  Peter — 
Many  Healings 

(Gp.  Matt.  viii.  14-17;  Luke  iv.  38-41) 

29  And  forthwith,  when  they  had  come  out  of  the  synagogue, 
they  entered  into  the  house  of  Simon  and  Andrew,  with  James 

30  and  John.     But  Simon's  wife's  mother  lay  in  bed  with  a  fever, 

31  and  they  told  him  of  her.  And  he  came  and  took  her  by  the 
hand,  and  raised  her  up ;  and  the  fever  left  her,  and  she  waited 
on  them. 

32  And  in  the  evening,  when  the  sun  had  set,  they  brought 
unto  him  all  that  were  diseased,  and  them  that  were  possessed 

33  with  demons.     And  all  the  city  was  gathered  together  at  the 

34  door.     And  he  healed  many  that  were  sick  with  divers  diseases, 

5—2 


68  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 29-34 

and  cast  out  many  demons ;  and  he  permitted  not  the  demons  to 
speak,  because  they  knew  him. 

29.  It  is  possible  that  there  has  been  a  transposition  of  the 
original  order.  Perhaps  the  healing  of  Simon's  mother-ia-law 
took  place  before  the  preaching  in  the  synagogue  and  on  the 
evening  of  Jesus's  arrival  at  Capernaum. 

30.  Another  kind  of  healing  is  now  exemplified.  Here  it  is 
not  a  case  of  demoniac  possession ;  it  is  an  ordinary  case  of 
sickness. 

31.  Jesus  touches  the  sick  patient.  This  is  the  usual  pro- 
cedure in  Mark. 

32.  Two  classes  of  cases  are  here  clearly  distinguished :  the 
sick  and  the  possessed.  Both  are  cured.  The  sick  persons  are 
brought  to  him  after  the  Sabbath  is  over.  Holtzmann  observes 
that  it  is  allowed  by  Jewish  law  (Mishnah  Sabbath,  X.  S)  to  carry 
a  living  person  on  a  stretcher,  if  in  need,  on  the  Sabbath.  The 
reason  why  they  waited  to  bring  their  sick  till  the  sun  had  set 
was  because  they  believed  that  Jesus  would  perform  no  exorcism 
or  healing  upon  the  Sabbath  day. 

This  may  be  so,  but  it  is  noticeable  that  Jesus  heals  the 
woman  (v.  34)  on  the  Sabbath,  and  nobody  seems  to  notice  the 
fact.  So,  too,  the  man  in  the  synagogue  is  healed,  and  no  objec- 
tion is  raised.  The  criticism  of  Sabbath  healings  is  not  made 
till  iii.  1-6.  It  would  seem  as  if  the  incidents  of  23-26  and  29-31 
had  not  really  occurred  on  a  Sabbath  at  all. 

34.  The  demons  are  again  made  to  keep  silent,  for  the  same 
reason  as  in  25. 


35-39.    Further  Activity  in  Galilee 
(Op.  Matt.  iv.  23-25  ;  Luke  iv.  42-44) 

35  And  in  the  morning,  very  early,  before  the  dawn,  he  rose 
up,  and  left  the  house,  and  went  to  a  solitary  place,  and  there 

37  prayed.    And  Simon  and  his  companions  pursued  him.    And  when 

38  they  found  him,  they  said  unto  him,  '  All  seek  for  thee.'  And 
he  said  unto  them,  '  Let  us  go  elsewhere,  into  the  neighbouring 
villages,  that  I  may  preach  there  also:    for  to  that  end  I  came 

39  out.  And  he  went  and  preached  in  their  synagogues  throughout 
all  Galilee,  and  cast  out  demons. 


I-  35-39]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  69 

35.  Holtzmann  thinks  that  Jesus  wished  to  avoid  the  crowd 
and  the  '  Jewish '  desire  for  miracles.  Is  there  adequate  evidence 
of  this?  One  object  of  his  leaving  the  house  early  was  to  pray,  as 
his  wont  was,  out  of  doors  in  a  lonely  place.  And  if  he  then, 
instead  of  returning  to  the  village,  goes  elsewhere  in  Galilee,  he 
goes  on  a  preaching  tour  in  the  district  and  expels  the  demons. 
There  is  no  sign  of  any  wish  to  avoid  publicity.  He  does  not 
want  to  be  detained  in  Capernaum,  it  is  true,  but  he  does  want 
to  preach  and  heal  elsewhere.  I  notice  that  Klostermann  takes 
the  same  line.  'Die  Vermutung,  dass  Jesus  einer  weiteren 
Heiltatigkeit  habe  ausweichen  wollen,  entspricht  kaum  der 
Meinung  des  Mc'  irpaii  evvvxa  ^iav,  'very  early  in  the  morning 
before  daylight.' 

Other  commentators  take  other  views.  Menzies,  for  instance, 
draws  a  sharp  distinction  between  'healings'  and  exorcisms.  Jesus 
was  always  ready  to  do  the  latter ;  they  belonged  to  his  mission. 
'Healings'  hindered  it;  for  preaching  was  his  real  work.  He 
therefore  takes  flight  to  resume  his  preaching.  Some  think  (as  I 
have  suggested  above)  that  he  merely  meant  that  Capernaum  must 
not  selfishly  monopolise  his  attention.  The  commentators  forget 
that  we  have  no  stenographic  report,  and  that  we  cannot  put  any 
reliance  on  casual  phrases,  all  the  more  as  Mark  has  his  theories 
and  his  theology.  There  may  be  some  intention  here  to  indicate 
that  the  Messiahship  might  be  prematurely  revealed  if  Jesus 
remained  too  long  in  one  place.  The  most  usual  explanation  ia 
best  given  by  Loisy : 

'Mark  shows  clearly  that  the  attitude  of  the  people  ot 
Capernaum  gave  Jesus  more  anxiety  than  encouragement.  He 
had  come  to  preach  repentance,  and  he  found  himself  a  magician. 
He  foresees  that  the  excitement  aroused  by  his  miracles  will  not 
be  calmed  on  the  next  day,  that  people  will  beg  for  further  acts  of 
healing,  and  will  not  turn  their  thoughts  to  being  converted,  so 
that  his  undertaking  is  exposed  to  the  danger  of  taking  a  false 
direction  from  the  beginning.  In  order  to  escape  from  this 
first  difficulty,  he  decides  to  go  away  as  soon  as  possible;  he 
has  been  hospitably  received  at  Simon's  house,  but  he  does  not 
remain  there  the  whole  night ;  he  leaves  the  house  and  the  town 
before  daybreak,  without  even  informing  his  new  disciples,  and  he 
goes  apart  into  a  desert  place  to  pray.  After  the  emotions  and 
the  bustle  of  the  preceding  day,  he  feels  the  need  of  calm  self- 
collection  in  the  presence  of  his  Father.  But  as  soon  as  Simon 
and  the  three  other  disciples  have  ascertained  his  absence,  they  set 
out  in  pursuit  of  him,  and  join  him  at  the  place  where  he  had 
stopped.  All  Capernaum  had  come  back  in  the  early  morning 
and  had  been  disappointed  by  his  sudden  departure;  the  disciples 


70  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [I.  35-39 

tell  him  so,  thinking  to  induce  him  to  return  for  the  very  reason 
which  made  him  leave.  Instead  of  going  back  to  those  who  are 
asking  for  him,  he  resumes  his  journey  in  order  to  escape  from  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  people  of  Capernaum,  and  carry  the  gospel 
elsewhere,  into  the  neighbouring  villages;  it  is  indeed  for  this 
very  reason  that  he  had  set  out'  {E.  8.  I.  p.  460). 
I  do  not  find  this  very  satisfying. 

38.  '  I  came  out ' — i.e.  from  the  city.  But  the  phrase  is  odd. 
Does  it  mean  from  '  heaven '  ?  In  that  case  it  would  be  a  later 
'theological'  reading.  S.S.  and  other  authorities  have  merely: 
'I  came.' 

W.  points  out  that  the  first  day  at  Capernaum,  in  which  this 
last  section  may  also  be  included,  has  a  typical  significance.  We 
had  already  heard  of  (i)  the  choice  of  disciples;  (2)  the  exorcisms; 
(3)  the  healings;  (4)  the  crowds  and  the  growing  reputation. 
Now  come  (5  and  6)  two  further  important  first  examples  of 
customary  practice. 

'  First,  the  solitary  prayer  at  night  or  in  the  early  morning,  not 
in  a  room,  but  under  the  open  sky,  up  a  mountain  or  in  some 
secluded  spot.  Secondly,  the  itinerant  preaching  (das  Wander- 
predigen).  Hardly  lias  Jesus  set  foot  in  Capernaum  before  he 
seems  forced  to  leave  it.  But  it  should  be  noted  that  Capernaum 
remains  his  headquarters,  and  his  wanderings  are  restricted  to 
Galilee.  Of  the  places  which  he  visits,  few  are  named.  An 
itinerary  is  wanting.' 

40-45.    The  Healing  of  the  Leper 
{Gp.  Matt.  viii.  1-4;  Luke  v.  12-16) 

to        And  there  came  a  leper  to  him,  beseeching  him,  and  kneeling 
down  to  him,  and  saying  unto  him,  '  If  thou  wilt,  thou  canst  make 

41  me  clean.'    And  Jesus,  moved  with  compassion,  put  forth  his  hand, 

42  and  touched  him,  and  said  unto  him, '  I  will ;  be  cleansed.'    And 
immediately  the  leprosy  departed  from  him,  and  he  was  cleansed. 

43,  44  And  he  sternly  charged  him,  and  forthwith  sent  him  out,  and 
said  unto  him, '  See  thou  say  nothing  to  any  man :  but  go,  shew 
thyself  to  the  priest,  and  offer  for  thy  cleansing  what  Moses  com- 
45  manded,  for  a  testimony  unto  them.'  But  when  he  went  out,  he 
began  to  publish  it  much,  and  to  spread  the  story  abroad,  so  that 
Jesus  could  no  more  openly  enter  into  any  city,  but  he  remained 
outside  in  lonely  places:  and  they  came  to  him  trom  every  quarter. 


I-40-4S]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAKK  7 1 

Did  Mark  obtain  this  story  from  oral  tradition  or  a  written 
source?  According. to  B.  Weiss  {Quellen,  A,  pp.  159-162)  this 
story  was  found  in  Q.  It  followed  immediately  upon  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount,  and  was  put  there  in  order  that  the  saying  in  44 
(Matt.  viii.  4)  might  illustrate  the  principle  laid  down  in  Matt. 
V.  17.  All  this  is  highly  problematical  and  doubtful.  Loisy  will 
only  go  so  far  as  cautiously  to  suggest  that  Matthew  may  possibly 
have  known  the  source  of  Mark,  and  that  if  this  source  was  Q, 
then  the  anecdote  may  have  belonged  '  to  a  secondary  redaction ' 
of  that  document, '  oh  Ton  tenait  E  repr^senter  J6sus  comme  un 
fid^e  observateur  de  la  Loi'  (E.  8.  i.  p.  124). 

However  miraculous  the  story  may  be,  there  is  a  great  air  of 
historical  verisimilitude  in  its  human  touches.  'Le  gros  du 
r^cit  n'a  aucunement  I'apparence  d'une  fiction '  {£J.  S.  I.  p.  466). 
Moreover,  the  bearing  of  Jesus,  his  curious  mixture  of  compassion 
and  severity,  his  insistence  upon  the  man's  obeying  and  fulfilling 
the  letter  of  the  Law,  all  seem  to  indicate  that  the  story  has  a 
historic  background. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  hard  to  see  how  there  can  be  much  history 
in  it,  because  it  can  scarcely  be  interpreted  except  as  a  tale  of 
miraculous  healing  of  actual  disease.  In  order  to  avoid  the 
difficulties  of  such  a  miracle,  and  yet  to  maintain  the  historical 
character  of  the  story,  it  has  been  supposed  by  some  commentators 
that  the  man  was  already  cured,  and  that  all  that  he  asked  Jesus 
to  do  was  to  pronounce  him  formally  clean  in  order  that  he  might 
not  have  the  trouble  of  going  to  Jerusalem.  '  Cleanse  me'  means, 
according  to  this  theory,  'declare  me  to  be  clean.'  Jesus  does  this 
by  touching  the  man,  and  thus  shows  that  he  regards  him  as  clean. 
Nevertheless  he  bids  him  fulfil  the  Law  and  show  himself  to  the 
priest.  This  story  is  then  supposed  to  have  been  turned  in  the 
telling  and  retelling  into  a  miraculous  cure,  and  in  this  form  it  is 
incorporated  in  the  Gospel.  The  artificiality  of  this  hypothesis 
needs  no  proving.  It  is  more  or  less  accepted,  however,  by 
J.  Weiss,  who  holds  that,  as  it  stands,  the  story  cannot  be  regarded 
as  historic  or  possible.  Leprosy  is  not  a  nerve-disease,  which 
'suggestion'  or  the  influence  of  personality  can  cure.  J.  Weiss 
would  not,  however,  so  much  mind  sacrificing  this  story,  as  he 
does  not  regard  it  as  forming  part  of  the  supposed  '  Petrine ' 
reminiscences. 

This  is  the  first  (or,  counting  the  call  of  the  four  disciples,  the 
second)  of  the  many  stories  in  which  Jesus  does  actions  which 
either  are  like  the  actions  of  Elijah  and  Elisha,  or  which  are  in 
marked  contrast  to  their  actions.  It  is  not  to  be  inferred  that  the 
stories  are,  therefore,  historically  baseless,  but  it  would  be  equally 
exaggerated  (in  my  opinion)  to  declare  that  the  Old  Testament 


72  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1.40-45 

parallels  or  contrasts  have  had  no  influence  npon  the  form  of  the 
stories  as  we  now  possess  them  in  the  Gospels. 

If  the  man  was  actually  a  leper  it  would  appear,  as  Gould  says, 
that  'it  was  a  part  of  Jesus's  disregard  of  the  merely  ceremonial 
part  of  the  Law  that  he  allowed  these  unclean  persons  to  approach 
him.  It  did  not  accord  with  his  nature  to  obtrude  this  disregard, 
but  he  had  no  scruples  whenever  the  Law  interfered  with  higher 
things.'  For  the  position  of  the  leper  in  Talmudic  law,  see 
Additional  Note  7. 

43.  ifj,0piij,T]ad/j.evo<s.  Revised  Version,  margin,  has  '  sternly 
charged.'  An  even  more  severe  expression  would  be  perhaps  a 
more  accurate  translation.  The  healing  probably  took  place  in  a 
room  of  a  house  (not  in  a  synagogue  as  Weiss  supposes),  and  Jesus 
rebukes  the  man  for  coming  into  the  room  and  sends  him  forthwith 
out  of  it — not  because  the  cure  is  not  complete,  but  because  he 
transgressed  the  Law  by  entering  it.  So,  too,  he  bids  him  offer  the 
customary  sacrifice  of  purification,  ets  fiaprvpiov  avrots  may 
mean  '  that  all  may  know '  that  you  are  cured.  See  Leviticus  xiv. 
Or,  again,  it  may  mean  that  the  priests  and  the  people  are  to 
perceive  that  Jesus  does  not  disregard  the  Law.  The  former 
explanation  is  more  likely. 

The  anger  which  Jesus  seems  to  display  here  has  not  un- 
naturally caused  the  commentators  great  difficulty.  The  causes 
assigned  to  it  vary  widely.  The  explanation  given  above  is  not 
particularly  satisfactory ;  for  why  should  Jesus  be  so  indignant  at 
the  man  breaking  an  enactment  of  the  ritual  law  ?  But  other 
explanations  are  hardly  better.  Weiss  supposes  (in  spite  of 
'straightway'  and  the  plain  meaning  of  42)  that  the  cure  had 
only  begun,  and  that  Jesus  drove  the  man  indignantly  out  of  the 
house  (or  sjmagogue  as  Weiss  thinks)  lest  he  should  infect  others ! 
Menzies,  on  the  other  hand,  thinks  that  Jesus,  though  in  his  pity 
he  cured  the  man,  was  afraid  that  he  would  now  have  endless 
lepers  brought  to  him  for  healing,  which  would  interrupt  his 
preaching.  Hence  he  wishes  the  cure  to  be  kept  as  dark  as 
possible,  and  that  the  regular  routine  at  Jerusalem  should  not  be 
omitted.  Gould  supposes  that  Jesus  '  is  vexed  at  the  whole  situa- 
tion of  which  the  man  makes  a  part,  at  the  clamour  over  the  mere 
externals  of  his  work.'  And  he  thinks  that  Jesus  bade  the  man 
go  to  Jerusalem  simply  because  he  was,  as  it  would  seem,  in  favour 
of  an  observance  of  the  ceremonial  law,  when  its  observance  did 
not,  on  any  particular  occasion,  conflict  with  a  higher  principle, 
with  a  higher  moral  law.  Perhaps  Klostermann  gives  the  simplest 
and  best  explanation  of  the  'sternly  charged.'  He  supposes  that 
it  does  not  really  belong  to  'sent  him  out';  that  is  merely  neutral, 


I.4XJ-4S]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDINa  TO  MARK  73 

*he  despatched  him.'  The  participle  eti^ptiir)<Tnfievo<i  (sternly 
charged)  is  intended  to  accentuate  the  order,  'See  that  thou  sayest 
nothing  to  any  man.'  It  is  interesting,  and  perhaps  more  in  accord- 
ance with  the  original  text,  that  the  S.S.  omits  '  and  he  forthwith 
sent  him  out.' 

45,  Jesus  is  reported  here  to  avoid  all  cities  and  villages. 
This  seems  unhistoric.  The  order  to  keep  the  cures  secret  is 
specially  characteristic  of  Mark.  It  can  hardly  he  historic.  For 
how  could  Jesus  have  possibly  imagined  that  such  miraculous 
healings  would  remain  unknown?  The  orders  for  concealment 
constantly  repeated,  and  as  constantly  disobeyed,  are  part  of  the 
theory  and  conception  which  control  the  Gospel  of  Mark.  See 
note  on  i.  23. 

'  The  statements  of  Mark,'  says  Dr  Carpenter — i.e.  the  prohibi- 
tion of  publicity — 'are  an  endeavour  to  harmonise  the  traditional 
notion  of  the  teacher  as  Messiah  with  the  fact  that  during  the 

first  part  of  his  ministry  he  nowhere  assumed  that  function But 

the  preacher  who  begins  by  announcing  that  the  Kingdom  of  God 
is  at  hand  is  forced  by  degrees  to  consider  his  relation  to  it.  So  far 
from  claiming  the  Messianic  function  at  the  opening  of  his  career, 
he  only  slowly  realizes  it ;  and  even  when  he  finally  accepts  it,  he 
resolutely  refuses  to  make  it  known,  viii.  30.... The  title  which  he 
at  length  accepted  was  rather  thrust  upon  him  by  circumstance 
than  deliberately  chosen.  It  was  adopted  with  reluctance,  and  an 
anxious  avoidance  of  publicity ;  it  involved  so  much  which  he 
could  not  share ;  it  failed  to  express  so  much  that  he  desired ;  yet 
no  other  designation  spoke  in  the  same  way  either  to  his  own  soul 
or  to  the  heart  of  his  time '  {First  Three  Gospels,  pp.  206-208). 

One  explanation  of  the  command  for  silence  is,  as  we  have 
seen,  that  Jesus  did  not  want  his  healings  to  interfere  with  his 
main  work  of  preaching.  He  healed  because  he  pitied,  but  not  in 
order  to  show  his  power.  The  healings  hindered  his  orderly  move- 
ments. Again, '  the  miracles  were  sure  to  be  treated  as  external 
signs,  whereas  Jesus  relied  on '  internal  signs.  As  external  ex- 
hibitions, moreover,  of  a  supernatural  power  they  confirmed  the 
people  in  their  expectation  of  a  national  worldly  Messiah,  and 
raised  in  them  just  the  false  hopes  which  Jesus  was  seeking  to 
allay.  And  finally,  by  the  excitement  they  created,  they  inter- 
fered with  the  quiet  methods  of  Jesus's  spiritual  work '  (Gould). 
I  cannot  help  feeling  that  this  explanation  (however  ingeniously 
and  variously  expressed)  is  somewhat  too  modern.  Menzies  is 
honest  enough  to  see  that  it  will  not  work  as  regards  the  demoniac 
possession  cases,  and  so  he  puts  them  into  a  class  by  themselves. 
And  a  very  big  class  or  proportion  of  the  healings  they  must  have 


74  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [1. 4o-4S 

been !  I  can  understand  that  Jesus  refused  to  work  a  •  sign '  on' 
command,  but  I  find  it  more  difficult  to  believe  that  he  did  not 
want  his  own  chosen  miracles  to  be  known.  He  does  not  ever 
seem  to  refuse  to  heal,  when  he  has  the  opportunity.  The  distinc- 
tion between  'internal'  and  'external'  signs,  drawn  by  Gould, 
would  hardly  have  been  familiar  to  him.  His  healings  were,  as  he 
believed,  miraculous ;  they  were  wrought  by  God's  Spirit ;  he  had 
no  modern  difficulties  about  them  or  dislikes  to  them.  The  view 
of  Wrede,  though  not  necessarily  pushed  to  the  lengths  to  which 
Wrede  pushes  it,  seems  to  me  more  likely.  It  is  the  view  that 
the  command  for  silence  is  part  of  the  theory  which  Mark  has 
elaborated.  Jesus  was  the  Messiah  from  the  beginning  of  his 
ministry.  He  knew  who  he  was  all  along,  and  so  did  the  demons. 
But  men  did  not  recognize  him,  partly  because  they  were  obtuse, 
and  partly  because  Jesus  consciously  veiled  and  concealed  his 
Messiahship  till  a  late  period  in  his  ministry.  Gp.  quotation  from 
Dr  Carpenter  above  and  note  on  i.  23. 

The  special  healing  here  related  is  doubtless  peculiarly  difficult, 
because  while  suggestion,  influence  of  personality,  faith,  and  so  on, 
may,  and  often  do,  cure  epilepsy  and  nervous  disorders,  they  can 
hardly  be  adequate  to  cure  leprosy.  It  must,  therefore,  remain 
quite  doubtful  what  the  basis  of  fact  in  such  a  tale  actually  was. 
Nevertheless,  we  shall  not  be  perturbed  by  the  favourite  argument 
(used,  for  example,  by  Gould),  that  'you  cannot  separate  the 
miracles  from  the  rest  of  the  story,'  and  that  '  they  stand  or  fall 
with  the  historicity  of  the  whole  account  of  Jesus.'  Of  how  many 
persons  and  stories  might  such  an  argument  be  used  ?  We  shall 
continue  cheerfully  to  discredit  the  miracles,  but  to  maintain  the 
historical  character  of  Jesus. 

The  command  of  silence  in  this  particular  case  may  conceivably 
mean  that  the  man  was  not  to  conduct  himself  as  cured  until  he 
had  been  to  Jerusalem  and  fulfilled  the  regulations  of  the  Law 
(Weiss).  But  the  historic  kernel  of  the  story  can  hardly  now  be 
recovered. 


CHAPTER  II 

1-12.    Healing  of  the  Paralytic  Man 
{Cp.  Matt.  ix.  1-8;  Luke  v.  17-26) 

1  And  when  after  some   days  he  returned   to  Capernaum,  it 

2  was  reported  that  he  was  in  the  house.     And  many  collected 
together,  so  that  there  was  no  room  to  hold  them  even  before 

3  the  door ;  and  he  spoke  the  Word  unto  them.     And  some  came 


II.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  75 

unto  him,  bringing  a  paralyzed  man,  who  was  carried  by  four. 

4  And  as  they  could  not  bring  the  man  up  to  Jesus  on  account 
of  the  crowd,  they  took  him  on  to  the  roof  of  the  house  where 
Jesus  was,  and  having  made  a  hole  through  it,  they  let  down  the 

5  bed  whereon  the  paralyzed  man  lay.  When  Jesus  saw  their  faith, 
he  said  unto  the  paralyzed  man, '  Son,  thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee.' 

6  But  some  scribes  were  sitting  there,  who  argued  in  their  hearts, 

7  '  What  blasphemy  does  this  man  say  ?   who  can  forgive  sins  but 

8  God  alone  ? '  And  immediately  Jesus  perceived  in  his  spirit  that 
they  so  argued  within  themselves,  and  he  said  unto  them,  '  Why 

g  argue  ye  thus  in  your  hearts?  Which  is  easier:  to  say  to  the 
paralyzed  man.  Thy  sins  are  forgiven  thee ;  or  to  say,  Arise,  and 

[o  take  up  thy  bed  and  walk  ?  But  that  ye  may  see  that  the  Son  of 
man  hath  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins'  (he  said  to  the  paralyzed 

11  man),  'I  say  unto  thee,  Arise,  and  take  up  thy  bed,  and  go  home.' 

12  And  he  arose,  and  at  once  took  up  the  bed,  and  went  forth  before 
them  all;  so  that  they  were  all  utterly  amazed,  and  glorified  God, 
saying, '  We  never  saw  anything  like  this  before.' 

Chapters  ii.  and  iii.  i-6  give  a  series  of  stories  dealing  with 
the  opposition  or  conflicts  between  Jesus  and  the  '  Scribes  and 
Pharisees.'  It  does  not  follow  that  these  incidents,  if  historic, 
really  happened  in  this  exact  order  or  in  such  rapid  succession. 
'La  combinaison  est  rddactionnelle,  et  les  ^l^ments  qui  y  sont 
entrds  ne  semblent  pas  avoir  dt6  puis^s  directement  dans  la 
tradition  orale '  (E.  S.  I.  p.  87).  Are  we  to  assume  that  this  story, 
like  the  previous  one,  was  taken  by  Mark  from  a  written  source, 
and  that  this  written  source  was  Q  ?  So  argues  B.  Weiss,  QvsUen.A, 
pp.  162-166.  Loisy  is  not  quite  decided.  For  the  history  of  the 
paralytic  man  Matthew  '  pourrait  bien  d^pendre  aussi  de  Marc  et 
de  sa  source'  (E.  8. 1,  p.  125).  It  is  noteworthy  that  there  are  odd 
correspondences  as  against  Mark  between  Matthew  and  Luke 
(Matt.  ix.  5,  Luke  v.  23  ;  Matt.  ix.  7,  Luke  v.  25  ;  the  order  of  words 
in  Matt.  ix.  6,  Luke  v.  24).  The  question  must  be  left  an  open 
one.  But  if  Weiss  is  right,  then  Mark  ii.  5  6-10  must  have  already 
stood  in  Q  when  Mark  was  compiled,  and  Loisy's  suggestion  that 
it  is  a  later  insertion  (see  below)  could  less  easily  be  sustained. 

I.  The  house  may  have  been  the  house  of  Peter  or  not. 
House,  desert,  mountain,  and  lake  are  the  conventional  localities 
for  the  various  scenes  of  the  drama. 


y&  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [11.  i-u 

2.  'He  spoke  the  Word.'  W.  would  regard  the  phrase  as 
meaning  no  more  than  'he  taught'  or  'spoke.'  More  probably 
the  Word  here  means  the  special  Word — the  specific  teaching 
about  the  Kingdom:  the  ' Heilsbotschaft.' 

4.  The  Greek  word  atreaTe'iaaav  would  mean  literally  that 
they  took  off  or  uncovered  the  roof.  They  unroofed  the  roof. 
W.  thinks  that  the  Aramaic  original  meant  only :  '  they  took  him 
up  on  to  the  roof  (by  the  outside  staircase).  I  have  adopted  this 
conjecture  in  the  translation. 

5.  'Their  faith,'  including  the  faith  of  the  patient  himself, 
for  if  he  had  not  had  faith  that  Jesus  would  cure  him,  he  would 
not  have  allowed  himself  to  be  taken  up  on  to  the  roof  and  then 
dropped  down  through  the  opening.  The  healing  was  intended  from 
the  first  to  follow  rapidly  upon  the  proclamation  of  forgiveness. 
For  the  healing  is  the  visible  sign  and  proof  of  the  reality  of  the 
forgiveness.  But  perhaps  the  forgiveness  was  assured  him  first  in 
order  that  the  man's  heart  might  be  encouraged  and  lightened,  and 
that  thus  his  body  as  well  as  his  soul  might  become  receptive  to 
the  religious  and  moral  power  of  Jesus.  But,  as  Klostermann  says, 
the  reason  why  Jesus  in  the  case  of  this  one  particular  patient,  so 
specially  calls  attention  to  the  forgiveness  of  sins  remains  unknown. 
I  cannot  believe  in  the  accuracy  of  Loisy's  exegesis  here.  He 
thinks  that,  taking  the  narrative  as  it  stands,  Jesus  was  not 
referring  to  the  man's  paralysis  and  that  he  did  not  mean  to  imply 
that  the  'forgiveness'  was  the  prelude  to  the  healing.  In  the 
story  as  it  stands  now,  the  healing  is  only  introduced  through  the 
criticism  of  the  Scribes,  and  was  not  implicit  in  the  forgiveness. 
I  cannot  believe  this,  though  it  must  be  admitted  that  there  is 
nothing  in  the  narrative  which  implies  that  the  soul  of  the  man 
was  burdened  with  the  consciousness  of  sin,  or  that  Jesus  read  his 
anguish  in  his  eyes,  and  wanted  first  of  all  to  secure  his  inward 
peace.  This  is  too  modern,  and  reads  an  added  meaning  into  the 
text.  But  surely  Loisy  goes  too  far  on  the  other  side  when  he 
says :  '  Que  J^sus,  par  la  remission  des  p^ch^s  veuille  faire  esp^rer 
au  paralytique  sa  gu^rison  corporelle,  ou  subordonner  celle-ci  £l 
celle-la,  le  text  ne  le  fait  nullement  entendre'  {E.  S.  i.  pp.  475, 476). 

8.  Even  in  Mark,  though  not  to  the  same  extent  as  in 
Matthew  and  Luke,  Jesus  appears  as  the  reader  of  men's  hearts, 
capable  of  discerning  their  secret  thoughts  and  penetrating  their 
attempted  dissimulations.  He  is  conscious  of  this  power,  and 
makes  it  known,  sometimes  with  a  certain  irony  (W.). 


II.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  77 

9,  The  mere  saying  of  either  is  equally  easy.  What  is  doubt- 
less meant  is,  that  the  power  to  forgive  the  man's  sins  is  proved 
by  his  cure,  which  is.  therefore,  the  really  difficult  and  important 
thing.  If  his  disease  is  cured,  this  shows  that  God,  ipso  facto, 
has  forgiven  his  sin,  '  It  may  be  doubted  whether  Jesus  regarded 
the  healing  as  more  difficult,  and  whether  his  argument  comes  to 
this :  he  who  can  do  more,  can  do  less.  It  seems  rather  to  mean  : 
he  who  can  do  the  one  thing,  the  divine  work  of  healing,  must 
be  able  to  do  the  other  thing,  the  divine  work  of  forgiveness' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  478,  n.  2).  But  Loisy  is  now  inclined  to  hold  that  the 
whole  passage  about  pardon,  and  the  Son  of  man's  power,  had 
been  added  later  to  the  original  story  of  healing.  The  old  story 
in  found  by  passing  from  5  a  straight  on  to  1 1  {E.  S.  i.  pp.  479, 
88,  107).  The  insertion  is  a  bit  of  Christian  polemic  against 
the  Jews  or  of  the  Pauline  Christology  of  Mark. 

Jesus  adopts  the  current  view  that  the  malady  is  the  result 
of  sin.  Nor,  however  much  some  theologians  would  desire  it, 
does  he  ever  really  combat  the  doctrine,  false  and  strange  as  it 
seems  to  us,  that  disease  implies  sin.  The  theologians  quote 
Luke  xiii.  1-5  and  John  ix.  2 ;  but  the  second  passage  is  not  in 
point,  and  in  fact  is  the  exception  which  proves  the  rule,  while 
the  first  cannot  surely  be  used  to  prove  so  large  and  revo- 
lutionary a  doctrine.  See  the  note  in  Luke.  Dr  Carpenter, 
however,  writes :  '  We  know  too  little  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  to 
make  this  negative  statement  of  yours  of  any  use.  I  do  think 
that  the  implication  of  the  tower  of  Siloam  story  makes  against 
the  doctrine ;  and  so  does  his  general  view  of  the  divine  action 
in  nature.'  Personally,  even  after  weighing  what  Dr  Carpenter 
has  written,  I  venture  to  remain  unconvinced  by  it. 

Were  the  Scribes  right  in  saying  that  Jesus  blasphemed  ? 
On  the  hypothesis  that  Jesus  was  God,  or  a  part  of  God,  they 
were  not.  But  as  they  could  not  know  this,  and  as  they  would 
have  refused  to  believe  it,  whatever  miracles  Jesus  might  have 
performed,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  from  their  point  of  view 
they  were  justified.  The  forgiveness  of  sins  in  the  strict  theo- 
logical sense  is  God's  supreme  prerogative,  and  no  man  can 
arrogate  it  to  himself  What,  however,  we  may  conceive  Jesus  to 
have  meant  was  this :  he  recognized  and  perceived  in  himself  this 
strange  power  of  healing,  which  he  believed  God  had  granted  him 
for  special  and  peculiar  ends.  He  shared  the  usual  belief  that 
special  maladies,  such  as  paralysis,  implied  previous  sin.  But 
he  was  also  filled  with  compassion  for  these  poor  sinners,  many 
of  whom  were,  he  thought,  more  sinned  against  than  sinning, 
while  others  had  perhaps  only  violated  some  difficult  ordinance 
of  the  ritual  law.     He  looked  into  their  souls,  and  saw,  or  thought 


78  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  1-12 

he  saw,  characters  which  were  not  in  themselves  essentially  wicker! ; 
characters  which  were  capable  of,  as  they  were  supremely  worth, 
a  moral  and  religious  regeneration.  Combining  these  factors, 
we  may  understand  how  Jesus  came  to  say,  '  Thy  sins  are 
forgiven ' ;  he  says  it  as  the  human  messenger  of  God  ;  he  says  it 
because  he  knows  that  he  can  prove  it  (by  his  healing),  and  because 
he  believes  that  the  healing  and  forgiveness  are  part  of  the  mission 
which  God  has  entrusted  to  him  at  this  supreme  moment  of  the 
history  of  his  race.  (Doubtless  Mark  means  more  than  a  sense  of 
mere  delegation.  'Mark  did  not  intend  that  Jesus  was  a  mere 
announcer  of  the  divine  forgiveness,  but  that  Jesus  of  himself 
forgave  sins'  (Klostermann).)  But  the  Scribes  could  not  appreciate 
this,  nor  was  it  unreasonable  on  their  part  to  disbelieve  it.  Even 
miracles  were  suspicious,  and  might  have  other  origins  than  the 
will  of  God.  Thus  their  integrity  was  no  less  than  the  integrity 
of  Jesus,  though,  as  with  other  reformers  and  apostles,  he  could 
not  appreciate  them,  and  they  could  not  appreciate  him.  Each 
side  called  the  other  bad  names,  and  from  one  point  of  view  each, 
and  from  another  point  of  view  neither,  was  justified  in  doing 
so.  If,  of  course,  Jesus  said  the  words  in  verse  10,  and  really 
meant  by  the  Son  of  man  himself,  then  the  justification  of  the 
Scribes  would  become  all  the  greater.  For  then  it  would  have 
to  be  admitted  that  Jesus  does  not  speak  as  if  he  were  the  mere 
mouthpiece  of  God.  He  does  not  even  say  that  God  has  "dele- 
gated '  to  him  the  divine  power  of  forgiveness.  He  seems  to 
assert  it,  without  qualification  or  explanation,  as  a  sort  of  native 
right,  an  authority  inherent  in  himself.  Such  a  claim  could 
hardly  have  failed  to  have  been  regarded  by  the  Scribes  as 
blasphemous. 

It  may  perhaps  be  worth  while  to  note  that  Menzies  is  wrong 
when  he  thinks  the  reason  why  the  Scribes  were  indignant  was 
because  they  thought  sin  could  only  be  forgiven  by  oflfering  a 
sacrifice  and  having  absolution  formally  pronounced  by  the  priest. 
This  misrepresents  the  Rabbinic  religion  and  even  the  Priestly 
Code  of  the  Pentateuch.  Deliberate  sin  could  not  be  forgiven  by 
a  sacrifice;  nor  did  its  forgiveness  need  sacrifice,  whether  in 
Jerusalem  or  in  Galilee.  The  entire  ground  of  opposition  to  Jesus 
was  that  he  claimed  to  himself  the  exclusive  prerogative  of  God. 
It  had  nothing  to  do  with  sacrifice. 

An  equally  large  error  is  made  by  Pfieiderer,  who,  in  spite  of 
all  his  splendid  learning,  is  not  without  his  share  of  the  usual 
German  Protestant  prejudices  about  the  '  legal,' '  outward '  rehgion 
of  the  Pharisees  and  the  Rabbis.  Pfleiderer  says  that,  according  to 
the  Pharisaic  idea,  God  Himself  could  not  forgive  from  free  grace, 
'  but  allows  every  sin  to  be  paid  off  and  worked  off  by  good  works 


II.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  79 

and  expiatory  sufferings.'  This  sounds  almost  grotesque  to  those 
who  know  something  about  the  inner  reality  of  the  Pharisaic  and 
'  legal '  religion  from  the  age  of  Jesus  to  the  present  day.  It  is  a 
calumny  to  say  that  what  Jesus  said  and  did  was  in  full  accord- 
ance with  the  religion  of  the  prophets  and  the  Psalms,  but  in  full 
contradiction  to  the  '  legal '  religion  of  the  Pharisees  ( Urchristen- 
tum,  I.  p.  636).  Nothing  can  be  proved  by  more  abundant  and 
overwhelming  evidence  than  that  the  conception  of  God  as  forgiving 
from  free  grace  was  a  fundamental  and  familiar  feature  of  the 
Pharisaic  religion,  just  as  it  still  remains  so.  The  only  question  at 
issue  between  Jesus  and  the  Rabbis  was  whether  any  man  had  the 
power  to  say, '  Thy  sins  are  forgiven.'  That  God  constantly  forgave, 
that  forgiveness  was  His  usual,  if  exclusive  mStier,  was  universally 
believed.    See  further,  Additional  Note  8. 

10.  Mark  makes  Jesus  here  use  the  expression  Son  of  man  as  a 
synonym  for  himself.  But  Jesus  does  not  elsewhere  (except  in 
iL  28)  so  use  the  term  in  Mark  before  the  scene  at  Caesarea  Philippi, 
and  then  only  to  the  Twelve.  Yet  here,  if  by  Son  of  man  we  are 
to  understand  Messiah,  he  suddenly  lifts  the  veil,  which  still 
surrounds  him,  even  for  his  disciples,  in  the  very  presence  of  his 
adversaries.  To  avoid  this  diflSculty,  and  for  many  other  reasons,  it 
is  supposed  by  some  theologians,  among  whom  Schmidt  and  W.  are 
prominent,  that  what  Jesus  really  said  was  that  men  (in  this  case 
himself)  can  have  the  power  and  authority  (given  or  delegated  by 
God)  to  declare  the  forgiveness  of  sin.  The  Scribes  hold  that  such 
forgiveness  is  God's  exclusive  and  never  delegated  prerogative, 
whereas  Jesus  avers  that  men  may  on  occasion  be  entrusted  with 
the  power,  and  that  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  has  the  power,  as  he 
can  and  will  proceed  to  show  by  removing  the  paralysis.  Jesus, 
speaking  in  Aramaic  (so  runs  the  argument),  used  the  customary 
expression  '  son  of  man,'  which,  however,  in  Aramaic  merely  means 
'man.'  The  translator,  however,  of  an  Aramaic  original  into 
Greek,  translated  the  phrase  too  literally,  and  thereby  inaccurately. 
Moreover,  the  translator  did  not  appreciate  or  share  the  doctrine 
which  Jesus  enunciated.  He  agreed  so  far  with  the  Scribes  in 
holding  that,  with  one  exception,  there  was  and  could  be  no  man 
who  could  forgive  sins.  That  exception  was  Jesus  himself  Hence 
the  translator  thought  that  when  Jesus  said  '  Son  of  man '  he 
could  not  have  meant  simply  'man,'  but  must  have  meant  himself, 
Jesus,  the  Messiah.  Hence  he  must  have  used  the  term  '  Son  of 
man'  as  a  synonym  for  himself  as  the  human  and  yet  divine 
Messiah.  This  view  of  the  passage  is  supported  by  the  argument 
that  as  in  Aramaic  'son  of  man'  habitually  means  'man,'  the 
Scribes,  if  Jesus  meant  by  it  something  special  or  mysterious, 


8o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  1-12 

could  only  have  inferred  by  the  connection  or  context  in  which 
the  term  was  used  that  it  was  intended  to  bear  a  quite  special 
signification.  But  there  is  no  such  connection  or  context  here  to 
have  enabled  them  to  make  such  an  inference.  The  context  here, 
it  is  urged,  does  not  afford  the  smallest  necessity  to  deviate  from 
the  usual  meaning,  because  the  words  '  man  has  power  on  earth 
to  forgive  sins'  in  opposition  to  the  words  'only  God  in  heaven 
can  forgive  sins '  yield  an  excellent  sense.  And  since  the  Scribes 
could  only  have  understood  Jesus's  words  in  this  sense,  Jesus 
himself  can  only  have  meant  them  in  this  sense,  if  he  had  not  the 
intention  to  lead  his  auditors  astray  and  to  conceal  his  thoughts  by 
his  speech.  It  is  urged  that  the  original  meaning  and  intention 
of  the  phrase  '  son  of  man '  and  of  the  utterance  of  Jesus  in  this 
place  are,  oddly  enough,  still  preserved  in  Matt.  ix.  8,  where  we 
read :  'When  the  multitudes  saw  it,  they  were  afraid,  and  glorified 
God,  who  had  given  such  power  unto  men.'  The  meaning  is  not 
that  every  man  has  the  power  or  authority  to  announce  the  for- 
giveness of  sins,  but  that  some  men  may  or  can  have  the  power. 
Thus  argue  Schmidt  and  Wellhausen  ingeniously  in  support  of  their 
opinion  that  Jesus  did  not  use  the  term  'son  of  man'  to  mean 
himself  as  Messiah.  Schmidt  seeks  to  strengthen  his  arg;ument 
by  quoting  Matt,  xviii.  18,  where  Jesus  enjoins  upon  his  dis- 
ciples '  to  exercise  this  blessed  privilege  of  assuring  their  fellow- 
men  of  the  pardon  of  their  sins  when  their  disposition  should 
justify  them  in  doing  so '  {Prophet  of  Nazareth,  p.  107).  But  this 
passage  is  found  only  in  Matthew  and  is  of  doubtful  authenticity, 
and  does  not  mean  exactly  what  Schmidt  supposes. 

In  spite,  however,  of  the  curious  words  in  Matt.  ix.  8  (the 
weight  of  which  must  duly  be  acknowledged),  the  argument 
deduced  from  this  particular  story  does  not  seem  to  me  convincing. 
Surely  the  real  point  at  issue  between  the  Scribes  and  Jesus  was 
not  as  to  the  possible  powers  of  man,  but  as  to  the  actual  powers 
of  Jesus  himself.  Jesus  is  not  concerned  to  champion  the  possible 
powers  and  prerogatives  of  exceptional  men  as  men;  he  is  con- 
cerned to  champion  and  prove  his  own.  He  wants  to  prove  that 
he  has  power  to  forgive  sin,  and  surely  not  as  man  (this  is  too 
modern  an  idea),  but  as  the  commissioned  officer  and  delegate  of 
God,  perhaps  even  definitely  as  the  Messiah.  It  is  not  unreasonable 
to  suppose  that,  if  anything  resembling  this  tale  really  happened  in 
the  early  days  of  his  ministry,  Jesus  should  have  said, '  To  show  you 
that  /  have  power  to  forgive  sins,  I  say  to  this  man,'  &c.,  and  that 
afterwards  'Son  of  man,'  when  it  became  a  recognized  title  for 
Jesus,  was  substituted  in  the  written  account  of  the  story  for  'I' 
But  it  seems  to  me  improbable  that  Jesus,  at  such  a  juncture  and 
moment,  wanted  and  meant  to  assert  that  man,  or  some  men,  or 


II.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  8 1 

specially  privileged  men,  as  apart  from,  or  in  addition  to,  himself, 
possessed  the  power  and  the  right  of  forgiveness. 

A  further  consideration  of  the   passage   suggests  the  same 
conclusion.     For  the  story  cannot  be  regarded  as  if  it  were  a 
stenographic   report   of  what   actually   occurred.      The   'Scribes 
sitting  there' — to  hand,  as  part  of  the  stage  scenery,  whenever 
wanted — make  one  a  little  suspicious,  the  supernatural  knowledge 
shown  by  Jesus  in  verse  8  no  less  so.     The  miracle  of  healing  is 
used  as  a  proof  of  Jesus's  divinely  given  power  to  pardon  sins. 
The  original  historic  story  may  have  been  limited  to  such  an  act 
of  healing.     If,  indeed,  the  view  were  correct  that  Jesus  spoke  not 
of  his  own  special  power  to  forgive  sin,  but  of  maris  power,  the 
talk  with  the  Scribes  might  be  historic.     But  it  should  be  noted 
that  the  miracle  of  the  healing  which  proves  the  power  of  for- 
giveness can  hardly  be  regarded  as  within  the  range  of  general 
human  capacity.    Because  Jesus  is  invested  with  the  divine  power 
of  working  a  miracle,  therefore  it  is  reasonable  that  he  should 
claim  and  possess  the  power  of  forgiveness  of  sins.    Hence  it  would 
seem  as  if  Jesus  grounded  his  power  and  right  to  forgive  sins,  not 
on  the  fact  that  such  a  power  was  within  the  range  of  man's 
capacity  and  privileges,  but  because  he  had  special  power,  above 
the  power  of  man.    Schmidt,  indeed,  thinks  that  we  have  here  one 
of  those  startling  sayings  which,  by  ascribing  to  man  such  unusual 
prerogatives  or  powers,  helped  to  bring  about  the    erroneous 
identification  of  Bar  nasha  (Son  of  man)  with  'Jesus.'     Like  W., 
he  argues  that  to  the  Scribes  Bar  nasha  (Son  of  man)  could  only 
have  meant  'man,'  but  this  argument  can  be  met  either  (with 
Fiebig)  by  holding  that  Jesus  purposely  used  a  term  of  himself 
(i.e.  'the   Man')  which  by  others  could  be  misinterpreted  (an 
unsatisfactory  explanation),  or  (with  Wrede)  by  holding  that  the 
conversation,  in  the   exact  words   here  recorded,  did  not  take 
place.    Matt.  ix.  8  doubtless  remains  a  difficulty,  but  I  find  it 
still  more  difficult  to  believe  that  Jesus  would  have  claimed  for 
man,  and  not  for  himself  alone,  in  virtue  of  his  special  mission  and 
office,  the  power  of  forgiving  sins.    In  a  magazine  article  to  which 
I  have  lost  the  reference,  M.  Loisy  took  the  same  line.     '  Con9oit- 
on  si  ais^ment  que  J^sus  ait  revendiqu^  pour  tous  les  hommes  le 
pouvoir  de  remettre  les  p^ch^s  ?    La  dispute  n'a  de  sens  que  s'il 
parle  de  lui-m^me  comme  Fils  de  I'homme.'    And  Holtzmann 
points  out  that  the  power  to  forgive  sins  is  connected  with  the 
power  to  work  miracles.     The  latter  is  the  greater  power  in  the 
eyes  of  those  addressed ;  it  is  a  power  exceeding  the  usual  powers 
of  man,  a  power  only  belonging  to  an  exceptional  man,  and  as  such 
the  Son  of  man  (that  is,  the  Messiah)  is  regarded.     Moreover, 
Jesus  does  not  say, '  /  forgive  you  your  sins,'  but  (maintaining  the 


82  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  i-i2 

exclusive  rights  of  God), '  Your  sins  are  forgiven.'  He  speaks  as 
the  confidant  (Vertrauter)  of  God,  as  the  proclaimer  of  His  grace 
and  love,  as  the  bearer  of  His  revelation.  The  old  Hebrew  prophets 
also  announced  forgiveness  of  sins,  speaking  in  the  name  of  God. 

Dr  Drummond,  however,  holds  that  Jesus  on  this  occasion  did 
make  '  this  high  claim  on  behalf  of  mankind.'  The  authority  to 
forgive  is  by  Jesus  '  included  among  the  prerogatives  of  mankind, 
which  each  man  must  exercise  according  to  the  nature  and  extent 
of  his  gift.'  Dr  Drummond  goes  on  to  say,  '  The  look  that  pierces 
the  heart,  the  gentle  words  of  forgiveness,  may  heal  the  suffering 
of  a  sinful  life,  even  as  Christ  healed  the  sinful  woman  whom  the 
Pharisees,  scandalised  at  this  contact  with  sin  and  tampering  with 
the  rights  of  God,  would  have  driven  to  despair  and  ruin.  How 
many  die  in  their  sins  because  men  take  upon  themselves  not  to 
forgive  ?  He  who  lives  with  a  holy  piety  in  his  heart  is,  wherever 
he  goes,  a  dispenser  of  divine  grace,  and  pronounces  forgiveness 
with  a  God-given  authority.  Scribes  and  Pharisees  may  call  this 
blasphemy  if  they  please ;  but  such,  I  believe,  was  the  thought  of 
Christ '  ('  Use  and  Meaning  of  the  phrase  "  Son  of  Man  "  in  the 
Synoptic  Gospels,'  Journal  of  Theological  Studies,  1901,  pp.  S39- 
571).  What  are  we  to  say  to  this  doctrine?  I  am  inclined  to 
think  it  is  too  modern.  'Forgiveness'  to  a  Jew  of  the  age  of 
Jesus,  and  even  to  Jesus  himself,  had  a  human  and  a  divine  side. 
One  man  could  forgive  the  wrong  which  another  had  done  to  him. 
That  side  of  forgiveness  is  not  here  in  question.  On  its  divine 
side  forgiveness  meant  the  abrogation  of  the  present  or  future 
result  of  the  sin  upon  the  doer.  In  some  cases,  therefore,  it  meant 
that  man  was  not  to  be  '  punished '  or  '  annihilated '  after  death ; 
in  others,  as  in  the  story  before  us,  it  meant  that  the  present 
consequence  of  sin  (in  this  case  the  man's  paralysis)  would  be 
removed.     Either  of  these  meanings  lay  within  the  divine  sphere. 

Nevertheless,  Dr  Drummond's  remarks  are  not  without  justifi- 
cation. It  is  not  too  modern  to  suppose  that  Jesus  so  profoundly 
pitied  certain  kinds  of  'sinners,'  and  that  his  insight  into  the 
recuperative  capacities  of  the  soul  was  so  keen,  that  he  was  able 
by  his  encouragement  and  sympathy  to  awaken  their  sense  of  the 
redemptive  love  of  God  and  of  hitherto  unsuspected  powers  of 
moral  regeneration.  He  hated  sin,  but  he  loved  the  sinner.  It 
is,  to  some  extent,  a  question  of  words.  If  Jesus  said  :  '  Your  sin 
is  forgiven,  lead  a  new  life  from  now,'  it  meant,  perhaps,  much  the 
same  as  if  a  modern  disciple  of  his  were  to  say,  '  Do  not  think 
yourself  an  outcast  from  God's  pity  or  God's  love.  Do  not  think 
yourself  an  outcast  from  human  pity  and  human  love.  You  can 
lead  a  better  life :  God  will  help  you  to  do  so.  Forget  the  evil 
past,  and  we  will  forget  too.     We  will  forgive  you,  so  far  as  our 


II.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  83 

human  action  and  love  are  concerned,  and  if  you  start  afresh,  God, 
I  feel  sure,  will  also  forgive  your  past  iniquity.'  If  a  man  spoke 
thus  to-day — and  spoke  thus  from  his  heart  and  not  merely  from 
his  lips — spoke  with  all  the  magic  of  a  strong  and  loving  person- 
ality, would  there  be  so  much  difference  between  his  words  and 
what  we  may  conjecture  to  have  been  the  meaning  of  Jesus, 
if  the  kind  of  words  attributed  to  him  in  verse  5  be  authentic  ? 
If  S  o-io  are  an  interpolation,  it  is  obvious  that  the  interpolator 
meant  Son  of  man  to  be  interpreted  as  a  synonym  of  the  Messiah. 
And,  on  the  whole,  it  does  seem  as  if  the  intended  reasoning  of  the 
passage  made  this  view,  in  any  case,  more  probable.  In  his  Com- 
mentary Loisy  is  still  of  this  opinion.  'The  argument  supposes 
that  the  formula  "Son  of  man"  means  Jesus,  that  it  is  not  a  mere 
equivalent  for  the  personal  pronoun,  that  it  signifies  the  character 
in  which  the  Christ  guarantees  the  remission  of  sins  and  that  it 
must  have  been  intelligible  to  his  hearers.  The  theory  of  Mark 
on  the  pre-ordained  obduracy  of  the  Jews  makes  it  unnecessary  for 
him  to  explain  why  the  Scribes  did  not  understand.  The  formula 
is  therefore  necessary  to  the  plan  of  the  discourse ;  and  it  is  the 
whole  discourse  which  appears  under  suspicious  conditions'  {E.  S. 
I.  p.  480).  It  must  be  confessed  that  Jesus  does  not  elsewhere  in 
Mark  ascribe  to  himself  the  power  to  forgive  sins  in  the  same 
direct  and  authoritative  form.  Apart  from  the  Messianic  difficulty 
which  the  passage  raises  there  is  thus  this  further  one  (unless  it  be 
interpreted  on  the  lines  of  Wellhausen).  For,  as  Loisy  justly  says, 
'  la  remission  des  p6ch^s  par  le  Christ  rentre  plus  naturellement 
dans  le  cycle  des  id^es  chr^tiennes  que  dans  I'enseignement  de 
Jesus'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  476). 

1 1.  There  is  no  doubt,  as  Loisy  says,  that  116  would  hook  and 
fit  on  well  to  5  a.  '  Jesus  seeing  their  faith  says  to  the  paralyzed 
man:  I  say  to  thee,  rise,  take  up  thy  bed  and  go  home.'  The 
construction  of  the  whole  passage  is  rather  awkward.  Jesus  begins, 
in  addressing  the  Scribes,  a  sentence  which  he  ends  in  addressing 
the  paralyzed  man.  The  commentators  say,  remarks  Loisy,  in 
his  ironic  manner :  *  Trait  pris  sur  le  vif! '  But  this  supposed 
'vivacity  'of  the  narrative  is  more  probably  a  'gaucherie'  of  the 
redactor. 

'  At  the  bidding  of  Jesus,  the  sick  man  arises,  takes  up  his  bed, 
and  goes  out  in  the  presence  of  the  astonished  assembly.  Every- 
body is  amazed  and  God  is  glorified  for  such  a  wonder.  Mark  sums 
up  the  general  impression  in  the  words  "We  never  saw  anything 
like  this  before."  A  very  natural  expression  in  such  extraordinary 
circumstances,  and  the  more  appropriate  here  because,  in  the 
second  Gospel,  Jesus  has  as  yet  done  no  such  startling  miracle  at 


84  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  i-u 

Capernaum  and  in  public.  No  one  takes  notice  of  the  use  of  the 
Messianic  title  or  of  the  claim  to  forgive  sins,  a  claim  which  the 
miracle  is  considered  to  have  justified.  The  conclusion  of  the 
story  has  reference  only  to  the  beginning,  as  if  the  healing  alone, 
and  not  the  Messiah  and  his  prerogatives,  had  been  in  question. 
It  would  seem,  therefore,  that  the  Messianic  argument  has  been 
added  to  a  narrative  which  was  already  fixed  in  tradition  and  even 
in  a  written  account '  {E.  S.  I.  p.  480). 

If  Loisy  is  right,  much  of  the  disputations  upon  the  passage 
would  become  superfluous.  It  may  be  then  that  Jesus  never 
ascribed  to  himself  the  power — even  the  delegated  power — to 
forgive  sins.  At  any  rate,  this  is  the  only  place  in  Mark  where  he 
asserts  or  employs  this  power.  Difficult  indeed  it  is  to  resolve  the 
problems  of  the  Gospels  and  of  the  life  of  Jesus.  And  much  may 
turn  upon  the  authenticity  of  a  single  verse !  We  have  already 
noticed  a  reason  for  supposing  that  the  insertion  of  S  6-10 — if 
insertion  it  be — must  have  been  already  added  to  the  story  in  the 
'  source '  whence  Mark  took  his  narration.  Moreover,  as  the  stoiy 
is  the  first  of  the  series  in  which  Mark  describes  conflicts  of  Jesus 
with  the  Pharisees,  he  would  not  have  put  it  in  this  place  unless 
the  insertion  which  contains  the  conflict  had  already  been  there. 
But  it  is  to  be  noted  that  it  is  the  first  of  the  series,  and  therefore 
the  insertion  might  conceivably  have  been  interpolated  by  the 
redactor. 


13-17.    The  Call  of  Levi — Jesus  eats  with  Sinners  and 
Tax-collectoes 

{Gp.  Matt.  ix.  9-13 ;  Luke  v.  27-32) 

13  And  he  went  forth  again  by  the  lake  side ;   and  all  the  crowd 

14  resorted  unto  him,  and  he  taught  them.  And  as  he  passed  by,  he 
saw  Levi  the  son  of  Alph^us  sitting  at  the  tax  house,  and  he  said 

15  unto  him,  'Follow  me.'  And  he  arose  and  followed  him.  And  it 
came  to  pass,  that  Jesus  sat  at  table  in  his  house,  and  many  tax- 
collectors  and  sinners  sat  also  with  Jesus  and  his  disciples:  for 

16  there  were  many  who  followed  him.  And  when  the  scribes  of  the 
Pharisees  saw  him  eat  with  tax-collectors  and  sinners,  they  said 
unto   his  disciples,  '  Why  does   he  eat   with   tax-collectors  and 

17  sinners?'  And  Jesus  heard  it  and  said  unto  them,  'The  strong 
have  no  need  of  the  physician,  but  they  that  are  sick :  I  came  not 
to  call  the  righteous,  but  the  sinners.' 


II.  13-17]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDING  TO  MARK  85 

13.  ' He  went  forth  again  by  the  lake  side,'  A  rather  awkward 
formnla  of  transition.  He  had  'gone  forth'  before  (i.  25)  and  he 
had  been  'by  the  lake  side'  before  (i.  16):  he  had  not  gone  forth 
to  the  lake  before.  The  formula  may  be  intended  to  show  that 
Mark  means  us  to  understand  that  the  incident  he  is  about  to 
tell  was  not  connected  in  time  with  what  has  preceded.  He  is 
only  about  to  give  another  example  of  conflict  (B.  Weiss, 
Quellen,  B,  p.  203).  The  conflict,  perhaps  also  the  call  of  Levi, 
which  is  now  (probably  only  artificially)  connected  with  it, 
happened  at  a  later  period  in  the  ministry,  but  still  at  a  time 
when  Jesus  was  teaching  publicly  and  widely  popular. 

14.  '  Because  of  its  situation  near  the  borders  of  the  tetrarchy 
of  Herod  Antipas,  and  its  proximity  to  the  road  which  led  from 
the  Mediterranean  coast  to  Damascus,  Capernaum  possessed 
several  toll  stations  occupied  by  numerous  tax-collectors '  (E.  S.  i. 
p.  483). 

The  call  of  Levi  is  related  on  the  same  lines  as  the  call  of  the 
first  four  apostles.  It  betrays  the  same  hand,  says  W.,  to  which 
observation  Loisy  adds  that  this  hand  is  not  that  of  the  '  r^dacteur 
(5vang61ique '  i.e.  of  Mark.     Mark  had  written  sources. 

Levi  may  have  heard  of  Jesus  and  even  been  present  at  some 
of  his  teaching,  before  he  was  asked  to  be  his  disciple.  His  '  call ' 
is  related  here  (at  whatever  exact  moment  of  the  Galilsean  ministry 
it  may  have  happened)  to  serve  as  the  introduction  and  explana- 
tion for  the  second  '  conflict '  with  the  Pharisees  which  is  now  to 
follow. 

15.  'His  house,'  that  is  Levi's  house;  there  is  an  interval 
between  14  and  15.  Some  think  it  doubtful  whether  15  was 
originally  connected  with  13,  14,  'Ein  Gastmahl  im  Hause  des 
Levi  fiigt  sich  nicht  liickenlos  an  14  an,  und  das  ovk  rjXOov 
KuXicrat  1 7  ('I  came  not  to  call')  wurde  besonders  gut  passen, 
wenn  Jesus  selbst  der  Veranstalter  des  Mahles  ist '  (Klostermann). 
On  the  other  hand,  Jesus  is  never  represented  as  having  his  own 
house  or  '  table '  at  Capernaum,  so  it  remains  most  probable  that 
the  host  is  Levi.  It  is  perhaps  best  with  Weiss  to  make  ■ija-av 
yap  TToWoi  refer  to  the  disciples  and  to  put  a  full  stop  or  colon 

'  after  avrm.  'For  they  (the  disciples)  were  many,  and  they 
1  followed  him.'  Who  were  the  '  sinners '  ?  For  this  question  and 
J  its  implications,  see  Additional  Note  9. 

'        16.     'Scribes  of  the  Pharisees'  is  an  odd  term.     Note  that 

*  Scribes   or   Pharisees  appear  and  disappear,  just  as  the  writer 

t  requires  them.     They  are  part  of  the  stage  property  and  scenery, 

like  'the  house'  and  'the  mountain.'     Here  their  presence  is 


86  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  13-17 

improbable.  Did  they  come  unbidden  to  the  banquet  and  look 
through  the  window  ?  The  story  seems  to  lead  up  to  the  great 
saying  of  Jesus  at  its  close.  This,  rather  than  the  details  of  its 
mise-en-scfene,  must  be  regarded  as  '  perfectly  authentic '  {E.  8. 1, 
p.  108).  And  that  Jesus  did  consort  and  eat  with  tax-collectors 
and  sinners  is,  without  doubt,  quite  historic.  On  the  question  of 
'ceremonial  defilement'  in  eating,  see  Additional  Note  10. 

17.  The  saying  of  Jesus  very  aptly  describes  a  most  important 
part  of  his  character  and  ministry.  He  sought  to  bring  back 
into  glad  communion  with  God  those  whom  sin,  whether  real  or 
imaginary,  had  driven  away.  For  him  sinners  (at  least  certain 
types  of  sinners)  were  the  subject,  not  of  condemnation  and 
disdain,  but  of  pity.  He  did  not  avoid  sinners,  but  sought  them 
out.  They  were  still  children  of  God.  This  was  a  new  and 
sublime  contribution  to  the  development  of  religion  and  morality. 
When  tenderly  nurtured  women  work  in  the  streets  of  London, 
and  seek  to  rescue  the  degraded  victims  of  deception  or  cruelty, 
they  are  truly  following  in  the  footsteps  of  their  Master.  But  it 
should  be  noted  that  there  is  nothing  anti-Jewish  in  the  bearing 
and  teaching  of  Jesus  in  this  matter.  It  is  only  a  development  of 
the  best  Old  Testament  teaching,  and  it  fits  in  with  the  Rabbinic 
teaching  upon  repentance.  But  to  deny  the  greatness  and 
originality  of  Jesus  in  this  connection,  to  deny  that  he  opened  a 
new  chapter  in  men's  attitude  towards  sin  and  sinners,  is,  I  think, 
to  beat  the  head  against  a  wall. 

Dr  Carpenter  is,  I  think,  certainly  right  in  urging  that  'if 
every  saying  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  could  be  found  in  the 
language  of  prophet  or  psalmist,  of  Rabbi  or  Scribe,  we  should  still 
ask  what  teacher  had  shown  the  same  passionate  sympathy  with 
the  poor,  the  suffering,  the  sinful ;  who,  before  him,  had  sought 
them  out  and  shared  their  meals?... what  writer  of  apocalypses, 
portraying  the  great  banquet  of  the  Kingdom,  had  deliberately 
announced:  "I  am  not  come  to  invite  the  righteous,  but  sinners"?' 
(First  Three  Gospels,  p.  363). 

Nevertheless,  the  Rabbis  would  not  have  condemned  Jesus 
merely  because  he  cared  for  the  outcast,  the  poor  and  the  sinner. 
They  too  welcomed  the  repentant  sinner.  And  they  were  intensely 
eager  to  relieve  distress,  to  mitigate  suffering.  Any  other  descrip- 
tion of  them  is  untrue.  But  the  Law  of  God  came  first.  God 
came  before  themselves,  and  even  before  their  neighbour.  As 
Jesus  says  that  a  man  for  the  sake  of  the  Kingdom  must  on 
occasion  leave  his  father  or  hate  his  mother,  so  they  would  have 
said  that  all  other  relationships  must  be  put  lower  than  the  Law 
of  God.     If  your  father  bids  you  transgress  the  Law,  do  not  obey 


II.  18-22]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  87 

him.  The  enactments  by  which  they  developed  the  written  Law 
were  not  a  benefit  to  themselves ;  they  were  honestly  intended  as 
a  fence  and  honour  to  the  Law.  It  is  all  very  well  to  speak,  as 
even  Dr  Carpenter  does,  of '  legal  casuistry,'  or  of '  restraints  of  the 
Law '  versus '  human  need  and  human  rights '  (op.  cit.  p.  364).  But 
should  not  God  go  before  man  ?  The  Law  was  perfect,  immutable, 
divine.  God  must  know  best ;  His  commands  must  be  perfect,  must 
be  divine.  Was  Jesus  to  be  commended  when  he  said  that  a  man 
must  on  occasion  hate  his  father,  and  are  the  Rabbis  to  be  merely 
blamed  if  they  say  that  a  sick  man  whose  life  is  not  in  danger  must 
be  cured  on  Sunday  and  not  on  Saturday,  seeing  that  his  cure 
involved  what  they,  in  all  honesty  and  sincerity,  believed  to  be  an 
infraction  of  the  divine  Law  ?  It  is  easy  to  speak  of  '  their 
sanctimonious  piety '  and  of  '.long-drawn  pretence.'  But  how  far 
more  historic  to  suppose  that  Jesus,  in  his  new  and  passionate 
enthusiasm,  misunderstood  his  opponents !  Jesus  would  not  have 
been  condemned  and  hated  because  he  cared  for  the  sick  and  the 
suffering  and  the  sinful ;  he  was  condemned  and  hated  because  he 
violated  the  letter  of  the  Law  and  justified  the  violation. 

It  is  amusing  that  Holtzmann  is  careful  to  point  out  that 
Mark  does  not  discuss  or  raise  the  question  whether  any  righteous 
people  really  existed.  Holtzmann,  like  Matthew,  can  hardly  con- 
ceive that  a  righteous  Pharisee  or  Scribe  could  have  ever  walked 
the  earth !  Even  Jesus,  in  all  the  passionate  one-sidedness  of  a 
religious  reformer,  hardly  went  so  far  as  this.  There  may,  how- 
ever, lie  in  Jesus's  words  a  certain  irony:  'You  are  the  righteous 
people,  as  you  would  fain  believe,  and  therefore  I  need  not  call  you 
to  repentance :  you  need  no  doctor.'  J.  Weiss  supposes  that  Jesus 
only  said  up  to  the  word  '  sick.' 

For  the  current  opinion  of  tax-gatherers  and  its  origin,  see 
Additional  Note  11. 

18-22.    Fasting 
(Cp.  Matt.  ix.  14-17;  Luke  v.  33-39) 

18  And  the  disciples  of  John  and  the  Pharisees  used  to  fast.  And 
some  people  came  and  said  unto  him, '  Why  do  the  disciples  of 

19  John  and  of  the  Pharisees  fast,  but  thy  disciples  fast  not  ? '  And 
Jesus  said  unto  them,  'Can  the  wedding  guests  fast,  while  the 
bridegroom  is  with  them  ?    As  long  as  they  have  the  bridegroom 

20  with  them,  they  cannot  fast.  But  the  days  will  come,  when  the 
bridegroom  will  be  taken  away  from  them,  and  then  they  will  fast 
in  those  days. 


88  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  18-22 

21  'No  man  seweth  a  piece  of  undressed  cloth  on  to  an  old 
garment:  for,  if  he  do,  the  patch  draggeth  away  from  it,  the  new 

22  from  the  old,  and  the  rent  is  made  worse.  And  no  man  poureth 
new  wine  into  old  wine  skins :  for,  if  he  do,  the  wine  doth  hurst 
the  skins,  and  the  wine  is  lost  as  well  as  the  skins.  [But  new 
wine  for  new  skins !]' 

1 8.  The  first  sentence,  as  W.  notes,  was  probably  added  later. 
It  is  wanting  in  Matthew  and  Luke.  The  subject  of  epxovrat  is 
an  indefinite  '  they,'  '  some  persons.'  Moreover  the  Pharisees  are 
not  original  to  the  story.  They  were  added  -to  make  the  story 
serve  as  the  third  'conflict,'  and  because  of  21  and  22  which 
concern  them  and  not  the  'disciples  of  John.'  The  odd  phrase 
'disciples  of  the  Pharisees,'  modelled  on  'disciples  of  John'  is 
also  added.  A  comparison  of  Mark  with  Matthew  would  seem 
to  show  that  originally  the  contrast  was  between  the  disciples  of 
John  and  the  disciples  of  Jesus.  They  who  '  came '  are  to  he 
distinguished  from  the  disciples.  They  asked  Jesus, '  Why  do  the 
disciples  of  John  fast,  and  your  disciples  not  fast  ? '  (in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  there  was,  perhaps,  some  relation  or  sympathy  between 
the  two  leaders). 

To  what  fasting  is  the  writer  here  alluding?  It  can  only,  I 
presume,  be  to  private  and  additional  fasts,  which  were  voluntarily 
undergone  by  individuals.  It  can  scarcely  refer  to  the  public 
fasts  of  the  community,  and  least  of  all  to  the  obligatory  fast  upon 
the  Day  of  Atonement.  On  the  whole  subject  of  private  and 
public  fasts  and  the  Rabbinic  attitude  towards  them,  see  Additional 
Note  12. 

19,  20.  The  two  verses  hang  together  and  are  both  of  them 
allegorical.  The  bridegroom  is  Jesus,  the  Messiah.  While  he 
lives,  the  companions  rejoice.  When  he  is  taken  from  them,  they 
grieve.  Fasting  is  only  legitimate — if  this  application  does  not 
draw  too  much  out  of  the  words — when  the  heart  is  sorrowful, 
when  it  is  the  outward  expression  of  inward  grief.  It  has  no 
value  in  itself.  Is  it  intended  to  deny  the  worth  of  fasting  as  a 
religious  act,  as  a  good  and  holy  work,  an  opus  operatum,  a  legal 
Leistimg'i  Quite  possibly.  But  at  this  period  of  his  ministry 
Jesus  would  or  could  not  have  thus  foretold  his  own  death.  The 
hidden,  yet  obvious  allusion  to  himself  as  the  Messiah  is  strange, 
when  we  remember  that  it  is  not  till  much  later  that  he  speaks  of 
his  Messiahship  and  imminent  death  to  the  disciples. 

If,  with  W.,  we  suppose  that  after  Jesus's  death  his  disciples 
adopted  the  habit  of  fasting,  the  passage  would  provide  a  justifica- 


II.  18-23]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  89 

tion  for  their  deviation  from  the  habits  of  the  Master,  and  it  would 
give  authority  to  this  justification  by  ascribing  it  to  Jesus  himself. 
But,  as  W.  says,  it  does  not  seem  likely,  if  he  himself  took  up  a 
hostile  attitude  towards  fasting,  that  he  would  thus  early  have 
permitted  a  future  change  in  the  conduct  of  his  disciples,  or  used 
80  peculiar  a  justification. 

The  best  explanation  of  the  verses  on  the  assumption  of  their 
substantial  authenticity  is  to  suppose  that  in  19  Jesus  explains  why 
his  disciples  reasonably  do  not  fast,  while  in  20  he  explains  why  those 
of  John  reasonably  do.  From  his  disciples  John  has  been  snatched 
away — he  is  in  prison — and  thus  they  have  a  good  reason  for 
fasting.  So  Loisy  (in  long  detail)  in  E.  S.  i.  pp.  496-499.  In 
that  case  there  is  only  parable  and  no  allegory.  The  bridegroom 
is  only  a  bridegroom,  and  he  is  not  meant  to  be  Jesus.  One  has 
also  to  suppose  that  the  text  was  somewhat  modified  when  the 
parable  was  interpreted  as  an  allegory,  and  the  bridegroom  was 
supposed  to  be  Jesus.  Verse  20  would  originally  have  run  more 
like  this,  'But  if  the  bridegroom  is  taken  away,  then  they  fast.' 
The  definite,  'The  days  will  come  when'  &c.,  and  'in  that  day' 
would  belong  to  the  'redaction.'  Moreover  dirapdrj  ('taken  away') 
would  to  the  redactor  refer  to  the  death  of  Jesus;  originally  it  did 
not  mean  death,  and  only  referred  to  the  arrest  and  imprisonment 
of  John.     On  the  whole  W.'s  interpretation  seems  simpler. 

21,  22.  These  two  verses  are  in  reality  quite  independent  of 
the  preceding  passage.  They  are  of  grave  importance.  '  The  rule 
that  one  must  patch  an  old  garment  with  old  cloth  is  not  observed 
to-day,  and  seems  to  have  been  thought  odd  even  by  Luke.  The 
meaning  is  clear.  A  rusty  kettle  goes  wholly  to  pieces  if  you  try 
to  mend  it.  The  old  garment  and  the  old  wine-skins  can  hardly 
mean  anything  else  than  Judaism.  Jesus  does  not  oppose  the 
Jewish  people  to  the  Kingdom  of  God,  which  comes  without 
human  interference,  but  he  contrasts  its  present  condition  with 
that  which  he  holds  to  be  right,  and  for  which  he  was  already 
working;  he  lays  down  no  rules  of  the  divine  activity,  but  of 
human  action,  and  more  clearly  and  especially  of  his  own.  The 
advanced  radicalism  of  these  rules  or  principles  is  very  remarkable; 
practically  he  does  not  apply  them.  For,  so  far  as  he  is  concerned, 
he  holds  fast  to  Judaism  and  to  the  Old  Testament.  It  is  also 
very  noteworthy  that  he  declares  the  creation  of  nevr  forms  to  be 
necessary,  whereas  in  fact  he  left  everything  in  this  department 
to  be  devised  by  his  community  after  his  death.  Yet  we  need  not 
for  this  reason  doubt  the  authenticity  of  the  saying:  there  is 
much  in  the  doings  and  sayings  of  Jesus  which  is  for  us  inex- 
plicable' (W.). 


EAST  LONDON  FUiO  FOR  THE  JEWS. 


XeiuLini  and  Reference  Library. 


90  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [11.  18-22 

In  the  connection  in  which  the  adages  now  stand  they  may  be 
supposed  to  mean  that  the  disciples  of  Jesus,  as  the  representatives 
of  a  new  religious  tone,  temper,  and  point  of  view,  cannot  usefully 
continue  the  old  forms,  such  as  fasting,  which  grew  out  of,  and 
only  suit,  old  and  superseded  religious  views  and  presuppositions. 
J.  Weiss  thinks  that  originally  the  sayings  may  have  been,  how- 
ever, intended  as  a  warning  against  attempting  to  enforce  the 
consequences  of  the  new  doctrine  upon  those  who  are  as  yet 
unable  to  receive  them.  Freedom  might  be  dangerous  to  certain 
unprepared  minds.  The  thought  would  then  be  like  I  Cor.  viii. 
10-13,  Romans  xiv.  13-23.  But  it  seems  unlikely  that  Jesus 
would  have  taken  this  line. 

I  will  also  add  a  passage  from  a  note  of  Menzies,  for  these 
words  of  Jesus  are  so  extremely  important  that  it  is  well  to  know 
what  the  ablest  commentators  say  of  them.  'The  movement 
Jesus  has  set  on  foot  is  a  fresh  and  growing  thing ;  it  is  impossible 
to  set  limits  to  its  expansion,  irrational  to  confine  it  to  forms 
which  were  not  made  for  it.  The  lofty  consciousness  of  Jesus  here 
finds  expression,  that  as  his  gospel  is  one  of  joy,  it  is  also  one  of 
freedom.  He  reverenced  the  forms  of  the  religious  life  of  his  time, 
but  he  saw  them  to  be  inadequate  to  the  new  principle  of  which 
he  was  the  herald  to  the  world.  He  set  no  forms  for  his  followers 
to  observe :  they  can  appeal  to  him  for  principles  but  not  for 
forms.'  I  do  not  find  very  much  from  which  I  dissent  in  this  note 
of  Menzies,  but  I  am  doubtful  whether  Jesus  was  clearly  conscious 
of  any  '  new  principle.' 

The  passage  gives  rise  to  many  reflections.  It  may  be  argued 
that  Liberal  Judaism  in  any  of  its  forms  is  an  attempt  to  patch 
the  old  with  the  new,  to  put  new  wine  into  old  bottles.  Is  it 
impossible  that  many  generations  can  observe  the  Passover,  if 
men  have  ceased  to  believe  in  the  miraculous  passage  of  the  Red 
Sea,  or  that  God  ordered  the  Israelites  to  eat  unleavened  bread  ? 
I  think  a  good  answer  can  be  found,  but  the  argument  is  serious, 
and  needs  most  earnest  consideration. 


23-28.    The  Sabbath 
{Gp.  Matt.  xii.  1-8 ;  Luke  vi.  1-5) 

23  And  it  came  to  pass  that  he  went  through  some  com  fields  on 
the  sabbath  day;  and  his  disciples  began,  as  they  went,  to  pluck 

24  the  ears  of  corn.    And  the  Pharisees  said  unto  him, '  See,  how  they 

25  do  what  is  not  permitted  on  the  sabbath  day!'     And  he  said  unto 
them, '  Have  ye  never  read  what  David  did,  when  he  had  need, 


II.  23-28]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  91 

26  and  he  and  they  that  were  with  him  were  hungry  ?  How  he  went 
into  the  house  of  God,  while  Abiathar  was  high  priest,  and  ate  the 
shewbread,  which  only  the  priests  may  eat,  and  how  he  gave  it 

27  also  to  them  who  were  with  him?'     And  he  said  unto  them,  'The 

28  sabbath  was  made  for  man,  and  not  man  for  the  sabbath :  there- 
fore the  Son  of  man  is  lord  also  of  the  sabbath.' 

The  fourth  conflict.  B.  Weiss,  Quellen,  A,  pp.  148-153,  would 
assign  this  story  also  to  Q,  but  his  arguments  are  not  convincing. 

23.  'The  story,  placed  as  it  is  somewhere  near  the  shore  of 
the  Sea  of  Galilee,  implies  a  date  somewhere  in  April  or  May' 
(Burkitt,  The  Gospel  History  and  its  transmission,  p.  80,  n.  i). 
The  crucifixion  took  place  a  year  after  this  date.  How  long  Jesus 
had  taught  before  it  is  uncertain. 

24.  For  the  reason  why  plucking  the  ears  would  be  a  violation 
of  the  Sabbath,  see  Additional  Note  13. 

25.  The  first  justification  which  Jesus  gives  for  the  conduct 
of  his  disciples  is  a  strange  one,  for  there  is  nothing  to  show  that 
they  were  in  real  straits  for  food.  The  analogy  seems,  therefore, 
strained.  The  reference  is  to  the  story  in  i  Samuel  xxi.  1-6. 
Abiathar  is  a  mistake  for  Ahimelech.  It  is  not  intended  to  argue 
that  if  David  acted  in  a  certain  way  and  violated  the  Law,  a  fortiori 
may  a  greater  than  David  do  so. 

27,  28.  The  second  justification  is  quite  different.  As  the 
Evangelist  understood  it,  it  means  that  Jesus,  as  the  Messiah,  is 
allowed  and  empowered  to  violate  upon  adequate  occasion  the 
regulations  about  Sabbath  observance.  For  the  Sabbath  was 
given  to  man  for  man's  sake,  for  his  benefit  and  joy ;  it  was  not 
intended  that  man  should  be  the  slave  of  the  Sabbath,  and  suffer 
because  of  it. 

The  argument  is  supposed  by  some  commentators  to  become 
more  logical  if  we  assume  that  originally  'Son  of  man'  in  the 
conclusion  meant  merely  '  man.'  '  So  man  is  lord  of  the  Sabbath.' 
The  same  questions  are  raised  here  as  in  ii.  1-12.  Was  it  meant 
that  man  has,  or  rather  that  some  men  have,  the  power  to  forgive 
sins  and  to  break  the  Sabbath  law,  or  that  only  the  Messiah  has 
this  power  ? 

The  xal  in  28  is  best  rendered  by  '  even.'  The  Messiah  in- 
cludes in  his  authority  power  over  the  Sabbath.  Or,  according  to 
the  other  interpretation,  '  even  of  so  important  an  institution  as 
the  Sabbath  man  has,  or  may  have,  control'     I  do  not  think 


92  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

that  the  argument  is  necessarily  illogical  even  if  Jesus  did  here 
use  '  Son  of  man,'  or  rather  '  the  Man,'  to  mean  himself  as  the 
Messiah.  For  if  the  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  it  is  reasonable 
enough  that '  the  man,'  the  divine  or  semi-divine  or  divinely  com- 
missioned ruler  of  men,  should  be  its  arbiter  and  lord.  If  Jesus 
did  not  use  the  term  '  Son  of  man '  to  mean  himself,  did  he  then 
say :  '  Therefore  T  am  lord  of  the  Sabbath  day '  ?  This  is  im- 
probable, and  we  must  in  that  case  assume  either  that  Schmidt 
(Prophet  of  Nazareth,  pp.  108,  109)  and  W.  are  right,  or  that  the 
whole  sentence  (i.e.  verse  28)  is  later  than  Jesus.  And,  indeed, 
this  last  supposition  seems,  perhaps,  on  the  whole  the  most 
probable.  27  is  authentic;  28  is  added  and  unauthentic.  For, 
as  Loisy  says,  if  '  son  of  man '  in  28  means  merely  '  man,'  why  is 
'  son  of  man '  not  used  instead  of '  man '  in  27,  or  '  man '  instead  of 
'son  of  man'  in  28?  Again,  while  27  continues  the  thought  of  26, 
28  does  not.  Because  the  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  therefore 
the  violation  of  it  mentioned  in  26  was  justifiable  (as  the  Rabbis 
say,  '  God's  commands  were  given  for  man  to  live  by ').  The 
general  principle  of  27  confirms  and  explains  the  example  of  26. 
From  the  fact  that  man  was  not  made  for  the  Sabbath,  it  follows  that 
man  can  be  dispensed  from  its  observance,  when  that  observance, 
instead  of  doing  him  good,  would  do  him  harm,  not  that  the  Messiah 
has  the  right  to  dispense  men  from  its  observance.  Jesus  does  not 
appear  to  claim  authority  over  the  commands  of  the  Law  in  virtue 
of  his  Messiahship.  He  seems  to  allow  to  every  man  the  right  to 
interpret  the  Sabbath  law  like  himself  But  he  would  not  have 
said  that  man  is  '  maitre  du  Sabbat  institu^  par  Dieu.'  So  28 
seems  'surajout^e'  (E.  S.  I.  p.  Si 2). 

The  Rabbinical  literature  contains  a  similar  saying  to  that 
of  verse  27,  which  is  only  found  in  Mark.  For  the  wording  of  it, 
as  well  as  for  some  remarks  upon  the  Rabbinic  observance  of  the 
Sabbath,  see  Additional  Note  13. 

So  far  as  we  can  gather,  Jesus's  attitude  towards  the  Sabbath 
was  something  like  the  attitude  of  Liberal  Judaism  to-day.  It 
must  be  observed  rather  in  the  spirit  than  in  the  letter.  The 
regulations  for  its  observance  must  not  be  allowed  to  destroy  its 
intention.  Directly  the  Sabbath  becomes  a  burden  the  object  of 
the  Sabbath  is  frustrated.  The  aim  is  the  important  point :  how 
precisely  we  carry  out  the  aim  is  less  important.  Nevertheless, 
one  must  not  push  the  antithesis  between  Jesus  and  the  Rabbinic 
teaching  too  far.  Gould,  for  instance,  goes  too  far  when  he  says: 
'The  old  religion  attempted  to  regulate  conduct  by  rules  and  forms, 
the  new  by  principles  and  motives,  and  these  are  foreign  one  to 
the  other.... Judaism  is  a  system  of  rules,  Christianity  of  principles. 
And  so  far  as  the  Sabbath  is  a  rule,  that  is,  so  far  as  it  is  Jewish, 


II.  23-28]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  93 

Jesus  does  abrogate  it  in  these  words.'  Judaism  is  not  without 
principles,  however  much  Christianity  may  be  devoid  of  rules. 
The  antithesis  reads  nicely,  but  is,  in  point  of  fact,  untrue. 

It  is,  moreover,  a  remarkable  fact  that,  in  spite  of  the  many 
restrictions  and  regulations,  the  Sabbath  was  upon  the  whole  a 
joy  and  a  blessing  to  the  immense  majority  of  Jews  throughout 
the  Rabbinic  period.  Yet  this  fact  does  not  detract  from  the 
greatness  and  originality  of  Jesus.  His  teaching  is  an  excellent 
counterbalance  to  that  casuistic  minuteness  which  is  the  danger 
of  legalism.  It  is  emancipating ;  it  enables  one  to  breathe  freely. 
In  modern  times,  at  any  rate,  and  with  modern  ideas,  the  Sabbath 
can  hardly  be  observed  except  on  the  lines  suggested  by  Jesus. 

It  is,  however,  to  be  noted  that  Jesus  does  not  say  that  the 
law  forbidding  a  man  to  pick  corn  upon  the  Sabbath  was  merely 
Rabbinic,  and  not  Biblical.  He  does  not  say  that  to  pick  corn  is 
not '  work.'  He  does  in  a  subsequent  passage  distinguish  between 
the  Biblical  laws  and  the  Rabbinical  or  traditional  laws,  but  here 
he  takes  higher  ground.  He  seems,  as  Menzies  says,  to  concede 
that  a  breach  of  the  Law  has  taken  place ;  only  it  is  an  excusable 
and  proper  breach,  and  may  be  taken  to  illustrate  the  higher 
principle  according  to  which  the  Sabbath  should  be  observed. 

Further  Note  on  the  '  Son  of  Man.' 

It  may  be  desirable  to  append  here  some  general  remarks  upon 
the  important  term  '  the  Son  of  man,'  and  upon  its  meaning  and 
usage  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels.  The  subject  is  one  of  fascination 
and  of  difficulty.  For  the  meaning  of  the  term  is  greatly  disputed, 
and  quite  a  large  literature  has  come  into  being  about  it.  It  is 
impossible  to  give  more  than  a  bare  outline  of  the  discussion  and 
of  the  problem  (which  has  far-reaching  implications)  in  this  place. 

The  term  '  the  Son  of  man '  is  in  the  New  Testament  (with 
one  exception,  Acts  vii.  56)  only  found  in  the  Gospels,  and  there 
it  is  exclusively  put  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  as  a  designation  of 
himself,  or,  possibly,  of  the  Messiah  or  of  some  mysterious,  heavenly 
Being.  It  is  never  used  of  Jesus  by  anybody  else  or  by  the 
Evangelists  themselves. 

The  term  as  used  in  the  Gospels  undoubtedly  often  goes  back 
to,  or  has  some  relation  with,  a  famous  passage  in  Daniel  vii.  1 3. 
There  in  one  of  the  visions  of  the  Day  of  Judgment,  which  are 
found  in  that  earliest  of  the  apocalyptic  writings,  it  is  said :  '  And 
behold  there  came  with  (or  'on')  the  clouds  of  heaven  one  like 
unto  a  son  of  man,  and  he  came  even  unto  the  Ancient  of  Days, 
and  they  brought  him  near  before  Him.  And  there  was  given 
him  dominion  and  glory  and  a  kingdom,  that  all  the  peoples. 


94  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

nations,  and  languages  should  serve  him ;  his  dominion  is  an  ever- 
lasting dominion,  which  shall  not  pass  away,  and  his  kingdom 
that  which  shall  not  be  destroyed.'  The  book  of  Daniel  was 
written  about  165  B.C.,  during  the  persecutions  of  Antiochus 
Epiphanes.  Before  Daniel  we  find  the  prophet  Ezekiel  addressed 
over  and  over  again  as  son  of  man.  In  this  usage  it  is  merely  a 
poetical  synonym  for  '  man.'  It  is  intended  to  emphasise  the  frail 
humanity  of  the  prophet  in  contradistinction  to  the  God  who  ad- 
dresses him.  It  is  as  much  a  synonym  for  'man'  as  when  we  read  in 
the  eighth  Psalm,  '  What  is  man  that  thou  art  mindful  of  him,  and 
the  son  of  man  that  thou  visitest  him  ? '  In  Daniel  too  '  one  like 
unto  a  son  of  man '  means  merely  '  one  like  unto  a  man,'  but  the 
question  is,  who  is  this  man  ?  It  is  usually  said  that  the  figure 
symbolizes  Israel,  or  '  the  faithful  kernel  of  Israel,'  and  this  still 
seems  a  very  probable  explanation.  Some  scholars  suppose  that 
it  means  an  angel,  or,  specifically,  the  angel  Michael,  the  guardian 
of  Israel,  and  some  that  it  means  the  Messiah.  Anyway,  it  is 
very  probable  that  the  passage  and  the  figure  were  soon  Messiani- 
cally  interpreted.  In  the  book  of  Enoch,  an  apocalyptic  compila- 
tion, not  the  work  of  one  writer  or  of  one  date,  the  term  'son 
of  man '  constantly  occurs  in  one  particular  section.  Here  there 
can  be  little  doubt  that  it  means  the  Messiah,  and  that  he  is 
conceived  as  a  supernatural  being,  pre-existent  in  heaven  before 
his  appearance  upon  earth,  and  different  from  the  old  purely 
human  monarch  of  Isaiah  xi.  He  is  very  distinct  and  different 
from  God,  but  he  is  more  than  '  a  mere  man.'  The  date  of  this 
section  of  Enoch  is  disputed,  but  is  most  probably  pre-Christian. 
Some  scholars,  however,  like  Dr  Carpenter,  think  that  the  lan- 
guage of  the  section  '  is  under  strong  suspicion  of  interpolation  by 
Christian  hands.'  But  this  is  not  the  prevailing  view.  Professor 
Toy  says :  '  The  conception  of  the  heavenly  man  in  Enoch  is  one 
of  the  most  grandiose  in  literature.  A  splendid  being  of  heavenly 
origin  stands  by  the  side  of  God,  and  is  by  him  invested  with 
supreme  authority  in  the  world.  He  was  chosen  before  the  foun- 
dation of  the  world,  has  existed  from  the  beginning,  but  is  to  be 
revealed  to  men  only  when  the  time  of  consummation  shall  arrive, 
when  he  will  intervene  to  judge  the  world,  to  punish  the  wicked, 
and  to  establish  the  righteous  in  perfect,  never-ending  felicity. 
He  is  a  man,  but  a  glorious  celestial  man,  the  renewer  and  re- 
generator of  the  world,  the  introducer  of  the  final  age  of  perfection 
when  all  the  inequalities  and  ills  of  life  shall  be  abolished  for  the 
righteous.  With  this  description  the  portraiture  of  the  Son  of 
man  in  the  Gospels  literally  agrees.  He  sits  at  the  right  hand 
of  power,  and  at  the  decisive  moment  comes  in  clouds  of  glory, 
gathers  his  chosen  ones  from  all  the  world,  dispenses  rewards  and 


II.  23-28]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  95 

punishments,  sums  up  human  history,  and  ushers  in  the  final 
scheme  of  things.  Such  passages  in  the  New  Testament  testify- 
to  the  fact  that  in  the  generation  following  the  death  of  Jesus 
he  was  identified  with  the  Enoch  figure,  the  Enoch  eschatology 
was  attached  to  his  person,  and  utterances  in  accordance  with 
this  conception  were  put  into  his  mouth.  At  the  same  time  he 
-was  identified  with  the  Old  Testament  Messiah,  and  his  purely 
human  experiences  were  interpreted  as  fulfilments  of  Old  Testa- 
ment predictions.  From  these  two  sources  the  person  of  Jesus,  as 
it  appears  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  and  in  certain  other  New 
Testament  writings,  was  constructed.'  Prof.  Toy  thinks  that  it 
is  unlikely  that  the  conception  of  the  Heavenly  Man  in  Enoch  is 
of  Christian  origin.  Its  starting  point  is  Daniel  vii.,  but  in 
Enoch  the  celestial  figure  is  represented  much  more  distinctly  as 
an  individual,  and  '  as  far  above  any  angel.'  '  Such  divinization 
of  man '  [does  it  really  go  so  far  ?]  '  is  probably  to  be  ascribed  to 
the  Greek  atmosphere  in  which  the  Jews  of  the  first  century  B.C. 
lived.  It  was  not  adopted  by  the  Judaism  of  the  succeeding 
time'  ('What  Christianity  owes  to  Judaism,'  in  Addresses  before 
the  New  York  State  Conference  of  Religion,  Series  vi.  No.  i, 
Feb.  1908,  pp.  29-32).  In  the  fourth  (or  as  it  is  also  called  the 
second)  book  of  Esdras  the  figure  of  the  '  son  of  man '  reappears, 
but  this  book  was  written  many  years  after  Jesus  and  even  after 
Mark.  It  remains,  therefore,  not  definitely  provable,  whether 
from  apocaljrptic  or  Rabbinic  sources,  that  the  phrase  was  used 
by  any  contemporaries  of  Jesus  as  a  designation  of  the  Messiah, 
though,  as  Dr  Carpenter  says,  '  the  possibility  must  be  admitted. 
And  the  language  of  Paul  concerning  the  Second  Man  from 
heaven  points  to  a  doctrine  of  some  kind  of  heavenly  type' 
(Firsi  Three  Gospels,  p.  83,  n.  i). 

As  to  the  use  of  the  term  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  there  are 
two  main  theories. 

The  first  is  that  the  historic  Jesus  never  used  the  phrase  of 
himself,  and  that  the  Gospel  usage  is  inaccurate  and  unhistoric. 
The  second  is  that  he  did  use  it  of  himself,  though  by  no  means 
necessarily  in  all  the  places  in  which  it  is  at  present  ascribed  to  him. 

The  first  theory  has  two  main  forms.  The  first  form  regards 
the  Greek  words  '  Son  of  man '  as  a  mistranslation  of  the  Aramaic 
bar  nasha.  Bar  nasha  is  literally  'son  of  man,'  but  it  is  an 
Aramaic  idiom  simply  meaning  '  man.'  So  in  Hebrew  ben  adam 
is  a  poetic  equivalent  for  '  man.'  The  first  theory,  then,  in  its 
first  form,  holds  that  in  Aramaic,  and,  moreover,  in  the  Aramaic 
of  Jesus  and  his  contemporaries,  bar  nasha  was  not  a  poetical 
.synonym  for  'man,'  but  a  frequent,  ordinary  idiomatic  usage, 
meaning  just  simply  '  man.' 


96  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

How,  then,  did  it  come  about  that  a  phrase  meaning  'man' 
was,  in  certain  passages  only,  translated  into  Greek  by  'Son  of 
man '  ?  Why  was  this  mistranslation  limited  to  passages  spoken 
by  Jesus? 

The  reply  is  not  quite  satisfactory.  Still,  even  if  the  theory 
in  its  first  form  is  true,  there  may  be  no  quite  satisfactory  reply 
possible.  Schmidt's  answer  in  the  EncyclopcBclia  Biblica  is  that 
in  certain  passages  in  an  old  apocalypse,  fathered  later  upon  Jesus, 
there  was  a  prediction  (based  upon  Daniel  vii.  13:'  There  came 
with  the  clouds  of  heaven  one  like  unto  a  son  of  man')  of  a 
mysterious  Man  coming  on  the  clouds  at  the  Day  of  Judgment 
or  at  the  advent  of  the  Messianic  age.  Mark  xiii.  26  is  the 
primary  reference  ('  Then  they  shall  see  the  Son  of  the  man  coming 
in  clouds  with  great  power  and  glory').  This  apocalyptic  pre- 
diction was  in  the  Greek  translated  '  the  Son  of  the  man,'  partly 
under  the  influence  of  the  mysterious  figure  of  Daniel,  and  partly 
because  it  was  believed  that  the  more  elaborate  translation 
heightened  the  mystery.  In  the  Septuagint  translation  of  Daniel 
'  Son  of  man '  has  no  articles,  either  before  '  Son  '  or  before  '  man,' 
and  this  may  have  been  the  case  originally  in  the  apocalypse 
which  is  the  basis  of  Mark  xiii.  But  this  apocalyptic '  Son  of  man ' 
was  rapidly  identified  with  Daniel's  '  Son  of  man,'  and  then  with 
Jesus.  Hence  the  starting-point  was  given  for  Jesus  to  be  made 
to  call  himself  the  Son  of  man.  Moreover,  as  Jesus  had  spoken 
of  man  generically  in  startling  terms  on  some  four  or  five  occasions, 
it  was  believed  that  what  he  had  said  of  man  (bar  nasha)  he  could 
only  have  meant  of  one  man — i.e.  of  himself.  Hence  in  these 
passages  '  Son  of  man '  (with  the  implication  that  '  Son  of  man ' 
was  a  title  which  he  called  himself)  was  used  to  replace  'man.' 
If  in  four  or  five  passages  '  Son  of  man '  was  used  to  mean  '  Jesus,' 
it  was  easy  to  extend  the  number.  In  genuine  utterances  of 
Jesus,  the  Son  of  man  could  and  would  be  substituted  for  the 
personal  pronoun,  while  in  unauthentic  passages,  more  especially 
in  mysterious  and  apocalyptic  predictions,  the  term  would  be  all 
the  more  willingly  used.     It  would  heighten  the  mystery. 

The  other  form  of  the  first  theory  would  admit  that  in  some 
places  where  'Son  of  man'  occurs  it  is  a  substitution  for  'man' 
{i.e.  that  in  these  places,  Mark  ii.  10  e.g.,  the  phrase  originally 
meant  '  man,'  not  '  Jesus '),  but  to  this  explanation  it  would  add 
another — namely,  that  in  other  places  'Son  of  man'  was,  following 
Daniel  and  Enoch,  used  to  mean  the  Messiah,  or,  at  any  rate,  a 
distinct  semi-human,  semi-divine  individual.  Hence  when  Jesus, 
or  passages  ascribed  to  Jesus,  spoke  of  the  coming  of  this  mys- 
terious being,  the  passages  mean  what  they  say,  only  they  did  not 
mean  to  the  original  speaker  or  writers  {though  they  do  mean  to  the 


11.23-28]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  97 

Evangelists)  Jesus  himself.  Jesus,  or  the  writers  of  the  passages, 
meant  a  being  other  than  he,  a  great  semi-diviae  Being,  perhaps 
the  Messiah.  Thus  in  some  places  '  Son  of  man '  meant  originally 
merely  '  man,'  while  in  others  it  meant  the  special,  heavenly  Man, 
the  'Man  upon  the  cloud,'  the  fore-runner,  perchance,  of  the 
Messiah,  or  the  Messiah  himself  (cp.  the  quotation  from  Prof.  Toy, 
cited  on  p.  95). 

Again,  it  is  specially  noticeable  that  in  Mark  the  phrase 
'  Son  of  man '  is  not  used  by  Jesus  of  himself  (except  twice)  till 
after  the  scene  at  Csesarea  Philippi,  where  he  acknowledges  his 
Messiahship.  The  term  grows  in  its  use  by  Jesus.  Mark  has  it 
fourteen  times,  Matthew  thirty,  Luke  twenty-five.  Moreover, 
omitting  the  use  of  it  in  Mark  ii.  10,  28,  we  have  the  further  fact 
that,  with  one  possible  exception  (Mark  x.  45),  it  is  used  by  Mark 
only  in  passages  in  which  Jesus  speaks  of  his  coming  death, 
resurrection,  or  Parousia.  Jesus  does  not  commonly  use  it  as  a 
mere  synonym  for  'I.'  This  fact  seems  to  show  that  the  use  of 
it  must  have  started,  as  it  were,  at  that  end.  If  its  origin  is  in 
Mark  xiii.  26,  and  if  it  is  pre-Christian,  it  might  gradually  become 
thrown  further  back  in  its  usage  by  the  Evangelists.  That  existing 
apocalyptic  documents  do  not  show  clearly  that  '  Sou  of  man '  was 
used  as  a  synonym  for  Messiah  is  no  certain  proof  that  in  some 
circles  it  was  not  so  used.  If  an  apocalypse  which  included  a 
passage  like  Mark  xiii.  26  (the  coming  of  the  Heavenly  Man  in 
glory),  was  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus,  the  Son  of  man  would 
soon  be  supposed  to  mean  himself,  and  then  it  might  be  naturally 
used  by  him  to  signify  himself  in  such  passages,  where  events 
are  spoken  of  which  were  to  lead  up  to  his  own  coming  in  glory — 
i.e.  his  betrayal,  death  and  resurrection.  It  would  be  a  further 
step  when,  as  in  Matthew  and  Luke,  the  term  becomes  sometimes 
a  synonym  for  '  I.' 

But  many  difficulties  remain ;  especially  the  grave  difficulty 
why  '  Son  of  man '  is  only  used  by  Jesus  himself,  and  never  of  him 
by  others  or  by  the  Evangelists. 

So  we  are  led  on  to  the  second  main  theory  which  holds  that 
Jesus  did,  at  one  time  of  his  life,  at  any  rate,  speak  of  himself 
occasionally  as  the  Son  of  man.  It  must,  however,  be  admitted 
that  this  theory  too  is  also  open  to  objections.  It  is  strange  that 
in  the  Epistles  of  Paul  no  allusion  is  made  to  this  title.  It  is  also 
strange  that  Jesus  in  the  Gospels  never  explains  it,  and  yet  that 
its  use  seems  to  cause  no  special  surprise. 

It  must  also  be  admitted  that  no  wholly  satisfactory  explana- 
tion of  the  reason  why  Jesus  used  the  term  to  mean  himself  has 
ever  yet  been  given.  The  suggestions  that  he  used  it  to  indicate 
that  he  was  the  ideal  man,  or  that  he  sympathised  with  lowly 


98  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [11. 23-28 

humanity,  or  that  he  was  not  a  political  Messiah,  and  so  on,  are 
all  fraught  with  grave  objections.  No  less  questionable  seem  the 
suggestions  according  to  which  he  used  the  term  in  some  sort 
of  composite  sense — ideal  man,  suffering  servant,  representative 
of  humanity,  united  together  under  the  idea  of  Messiahship. 
Difificult  again  is  the  view  that  Jesus  gave  the  term  'a  varying 
application  according  to  circumstances,'  which  is  elaborated  by 
Dr  Drummond.  None  of  these  explanations  seem  to  explain  why 
the  term  is  not  only  closely  connected  with  the  figure  in  Daniel, 
but  is  mainly  used  by  Jesus  in  passages  which  deal  with  his  death, 
resurrection,  and  Parousia. 

It  is  another  question  whether,  if  Jesus  did  not  call  himself 
Son  of  man,  he  did  not  claim  to  be  Messiah.  Schmidt  thinks  that 
the  second  negative  follows  from  the  first,  but  this  is  by  no  means 
the  case. 

The  vexed  question  has,  perhaps,  entered  into  a  fresh  stage  by 
the  researches  of  Gressman  on  the  origins  of  Jewish  e.schatology. 
Gressman  fully  admits  that  'the  son  of  man'  meant  in  Aramaic 
merely  '  the  man.'  He  further  argues  that  since  the  Septuagint 
renders  the  Hebrew  '  ben  adam '  by  vioi  dvdpwirov  (son  of  man),  we 
may  assume  that  in  the  'Greek  jargon'  of  the  Alexandrian  Jews  vw 
dvOpciirov  (son  of  man)  was  completely  synon3'mous  with  dvGpcoiroi 
(man),  and  that  the  same  will  have  been  the  case  with  the  Greek- 
speaking  Palestinians.  But  he  gives  grounds  for  believing  that 
'The  Man'  was  a  current  appellation  of  an  old  apocalyptic  figure. 
This  figure  was  not  invented  by  the  author  of  Daniel,  but  was 
borrowed  by  that  author  from  old  apocalyptic  traditions  and  material, 
and  identified  with  the  people  of  Israel.  The  figure  in  Enoch  and 
Ezra  iv.  was  not  merely  elaborated  from  Daniel  (any  more  than  it 
was  merely  elaborated  from  Daniel  in  the  old  apocalypse  contained 
in  Mark  xiii.) ;  it  was  borrowed  and  elaborated  from  current 
apocalyptic  material.  'The  Man'  was  a  shortened  form  of  some 
longer  original;  perhaps  'the  first  man.'  'The'  is  emphatic:  'The 
Man'  is  the  well-known,  mysterious,  heavenly  Man,  with  special 
functions  predetermined  for  him  at  the  Last  Judgment.  He  is 
not  of  Jewish  origin,  but  borrowed  by  Jewish  writers  from  foreign 
apocalyptic  material  and  tradition.  He  is  a  parallel  figure  to  the 
Messiah,  but  of  quite  different  origin.  The  Messiah  is  an  earthly, 
the  Son  of  man  a  heavenly  figure.  Yet  they  could  easily  become 
identified  or  confused  with  each  other,  just  as  in  Daniel  the  Son  of 
man  is  identified  with  Israel.  As  the  functions  of  the  Messiah  at 
the  Last  Judgment  and  in  the  new  age  became  more  exalted,  it 
was  all  the  easier  to  identify  or  combine  him  with  the  apocalyptic 
figure  of  the  'Son  of  man,'  or  rather  of  'the  Man.' 

If  all  this  be  accurate,  the  following  deductions  emerge.    If 


II.  23-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  99 

Jesus  spoke  about '  the  Man,'  he  might  have  been  understood  by 
all  who  had  heard  of  the  current  apocalyptic  traditions  and  con- 
ceptions. He  may  have  used  the  term  to  signify  a  being  other 
than  himself,  or  he  may  have  used  it  of  himself  as  the  Messiah. 
If  he  did  not  believe  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  or  before  he  had 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  he  was  the  Messiah,  he  may  have 
distinguished  'the  Man'  from  himself,  and  a  reflection  of  this 
usage  may  perhaps  be  still  seen  in  those  passages  where  in  one 
clause  he  uses  the  personal  pronoun,  in  the  second  the  Son  of  man 
(as  if  he  and  the  Son  of  man  were  not  identical).  But  if  and  when 
he  felt  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  he  can  only  have  meant  by  '  the 
Man,'  when  and  if  he  used  the  term,  himself.  Lastly,  it  may  now 
be  found  in  many  places  and  passages  in  the  Synoptics  where 
Jesus  did  not  employ  it  himself.  Each  occasion  must  be  judged 
on  its  own  merits.  The  fact  that  the  term  is  never  applied  of 
Jesus,  but  always  only  used  hy  him,  is  a  good  argument  in  favour 
of  the  view  that  he  did  actually  employ  it. 

We  must,  indeed,  admit  that  we  can  trace  within  the  Synoptics 
themselves  the  growth  of  the  application  of  the  term  to  Jesus. 
Thus  in  Luke  vi.  22,  where  Matthew  has  '  me,'  Luke  has  '  Son  of 
man,'  and  the  same  is  the  case  in  Luke  xii.  8.  Again,  in  Mark  viii. 
27  Jesus  says  :  '  Who  do  they  say  I  am  ? '  (and  so  in  Luke  ix.  18), 
whereas  Matthew  has, '  Who  do  they  say  that  the  Son  of  man  is  ? ' 

In  his  last  book  (TAe  Fropket  of  Nazareth)  Schmidt  has 
again  reiterated  his  arguments  that  Jesus  never  claimed  to  be  the 
Messiah,  and  never  used  'Son  of  man'  or  'the  Man,'  whether  of 
himself  or  not  of  himself.  Of  passages  where  Son  of  man  occurs, 
some  four  or  five  only  go  back,  as  he  thinks,  to  authentic  sayings 
of  Jesus,  but  in  each  of  these  cases  not  Jesus,  and  not  the  Messiah, 
but  man  generally,  is  meant.  These  cases  are  Mark  ii.  10  and  28, 
Matthew  viii.  20  and  xii.  32,  and  a  passage  at  the  root  of  the 
present  predictions  of  suffering  and  death.  Of  these  passages  the 
suggested  interpretation  is  most  likely  in  Mark  ii.  10  and  28 
(human  power  to  forgive  sins;  man  lord  of  the  Sabbath).  In 
Matthew  viii.  20  and  xii.  32  it  seems  to  me  most  improbable 
(cjo.  the  notes  on  these  verses),  while  the  view  that  Jesus  said, 
when  death  began  to  appear  to  him  as  a  possible  issue  of  his 
career, '  man  must  pass  away '  (Mark  xiv.  21),  and  added, '  but  he 
will  rise  again'  (Mark  ix.  31),  seems  exceedingly  strained. 
{Prophet  of  Nazareth,  pp.   118,  125.) 

One  further  difficulty  to  the  view  that  Jesus  used  the  term 
Son  of  man  to  mean  himself  may,  however,  here  be  added.  For 
was  not '  the  Man '  a  more  exalted  and  half-divine  being  than  the 
historic  Jesus  thought  himself  to  be  ?  If  Jesus  claimed  to  be  the 
Messiah — and  I  still  think  he  did — was  not  his  conception  of  the 


lOO  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

Messiah  humbler  (if  more  spiritual)  ?  Was  it  not  in  that  respect 
nearer  to  the  old  Messiah  of  the  prophets  or  to  the  servant  of 
Isaiah  1.  and  liii.  ?  We  may  perhaps  get  over  this  difficulty  in  the 
following  way.  In  the  later  months  of  his  short  ministry  Jesus 
may  have  come  to  believe  not  only  that  God  had  invested  him  with 
a  lofty  office  (though  it  was  the  greatness  of  service),  but  also  that 
if  in  the  discharge  of  that  office  he  must  encounter  death,  he  would 
be  transformed,  or  raised,  after  death  into  the  veritable  Son  of 
man  of  the  apocalyptic  seers.  There  is  a  certain  attractiveness  in 
Schweitzer's  theory  that  Jesus  gradually  identified  himself  with 
the  heavenly  Son  of  man,  who  was  also  the  Messiah,  and  that  he 
believed  he  would  be  transformed  into  that  super-earthly  being. 
But  it  is  surely  inaccurate  to  say  that  at  that  time  the  Messiah 
was  generally  regarded  as  an  '  ubernatiirliche  Personlichkeit.' 
Reimarus,  whom  Schweitzer  has  now  made  many  of  us  read,  with 
his  insistence  upon  the  old  '  political '  or  theocratic  Messiahship,  is 
not,  in  truth,  so  easily  disposed  of. 

In  his  excellent  and  informing  pamphlet,  The  Messianic  Con- 
sciousness of  Jesus  (1907),  the  veteran  scholar,  H.  J.  Holtzmann, 
has  investigated  the  subject  anew.  We  see  from  his  book,  and 
from  the  survey  of  opinions  which  he  gives,  how  widespread  is  the 
desire  to  dissociate  Jesus  from  anything  Jewish.  The  Jewish 
Messiah  is  depressed  and  depreciated,  and  Jesus  is  magnified  and 
exalted.  He  must,  so  far  as  possible,  be  kept  free  from  all  contact 
with  what  is  Jewish,  and  specially  from  the  contamination  of  the 
Jewish  conception  of  the  Messiah.  For  the  Jewish  Messiah  is  a 
mere  conquering  king,  a  political,  particularistic  figure,  whose 
sole  function  it  is  to  cause  the  Jews  to  triumph  over  their  enemies 
and  to  make  them  the  supreme  world-power.  Far  better  Daniel's 
man  who  comes  upon  the  clouds  than  the  Jewish  Messiah  with  his 
selfish  Jewish  empire,  his  odious  Jewish  triumphs.  The  anti- 
Jewish  bias,  the  desire  to  press  to  the  utmost  the  dififereuce 
between  Jesus  and  Judaism,  to  depress  the  one  and  to  magnify 
the  other,  is  constantly  apparent.  No  one  would  imagine  iu 
reading  Merx,  for  example,  or  others  of  his  stamp,  and  even 
Holtzmann  himself,  that  there  was  any  ethical  or  spiritual  side  to 
the  '  Jewish '  Messiah.  The  Judenmessias  would  appear  to  be  a 
sort  of  Napoleon,  protected  and  inspired  by  the  narrow  'Jewish'  God. 

The  impartial  historian  will  not  deny  that  there  was  a  'particu- 
larist '  and  '  national '  side  to  the  Jewish  Messiah,  which  was 
sometimes  more  and  sometimes  less  prominent.  But  it  is  not 
impartial  to  deny  or  ignore  that  there  was  another  side  also. 
Jesus  had  not  to  go  beyond  Isaiah  for  a  conception  of  the  Messiah 
which  was  both  Jewish  and  ethical,  far  more  ethical,  indeed,  than 
the  'Man'  of  Daniel  vii.  13. 


II.  23-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  loi 

For  unto  us  a  child  is  bom,  unto  us  a  son  is  given ; 

And  the  government  shall  be  upon  his  shoulder ; 
And  his  name  shall  be  called  Wonder-Counsellor, 

Divine  Hero,  Father  of  Glory,  Prince  of  Peace. 
For  the  increase  of  dominion  and  for  peace  without  end, 

Upon  the  throne  of  David  and  upon  his  Kingdom, 
To  establish  and  support  it  by  justice  and  by  righteousness. 

From  henceforth  even  for  ever. 

And  the  most  complete,  essential  description  of  the  Messiah, 
which  has  always  dwelt  most  abidingly  and  lovingly  in  the  Jewish 
consciousness,  is  the  following  (Isaiah  xi.) : 

And  there  shall  come  forth  a  shoot  out  of  the  stock  of  Jesse, 

And  a  branch  of  his  root  shall  bear  fruit. 
And  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  shall  rest  upon  him, 

The  spirit  of  wisdom  and  understanding. 
The  spirit  of  counsel  and  might, 

The  spirit  of  knowledge  and  of  the  fear  of  the  Lord. 
And  he  shall  not  judge  after  the  sight  of  his  eyes, 

Neither  arbitrate  after  the  hearing  of  his  ears : 
But  with  righteousness  shall  he  judge  the  poor, 

And  arbitrate  with  equity  for  the  afHicted  of  the  land : 
And  he  shall  smite  the  tyrannous  with  the  rod  of  his  mouth. 

And  with  the  breath  of  his  lips  shall  he  slay  the  wicked. 
And  righteousness  shall  be  the  girdle  of  his  loins. 

And  faithfulness  the  girdle  of  his  reins. 

This,  upon  the  whole,  is  the  truest,  fullest  picture  that  we  have 
of  the  Jewish  Messiah.  This  is  the  prevailing  Jewish  conception 
of  that  king  and  of  his  rule,  to  which  the  yoke  of  the  Law  is 
ultimately  to  lead,  and  hence  this  is  the  portion  of  the  prophets 
which,  perhaps  already  in  the  age  of  Jesus,  was  ordained  by  the 
Eabbis  to  be  read  in  synagogue  upon  the  festival  which  com- 
memorates the  giving  of  the  Law  (Pentecost). 

One  wonders  whether  the  historic  Jesus,  who,  after  all,  is 
considerably  hidden,  as  well  as  considerably  revealed  to  us,  in  the 
Synoptic  Gospels,  did  not  appreciate  the  picture  drawn  in  Isaiah  xi. 
What  did  he  think  of  his  own  relation  to  that  figure,  to  the 
righteous  ruler  filled  with  the  spirit  of  God  ?  It  must  be  freely 
confessed  that  there  is  no  reference  to  Isaiah  xi.  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels. 

Holtzmann  himself  clings  to  the  view  that  Jesus  regarded 
himself  as  the  Messiah,  but  not  as  the  '  Jewish '  Messiah,  or  Son 
of  David.  The  remarkable  passage  in  Mark  xii.  35-37,  the  signifi- 
cance of  which  cannot  be  denied,  sufficiently  proves  this.     On  the 


I02  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [11.23-28 

other  hand,  the  trial  proves  that  a  Messiah  in  some  sense  Jesus 
did  claim  to  be.  If  Jesus  (a)  believed  that  the  Kingdom  was  soon 
to  come,  (6)  that  he  was  to  bring  about,  or  be  closely  connected 
with,  its  coming,  and  (c)  that  he  was  invested  by  God  with  a 
special  mission,  how  could  he  help  drawing  the  conclusion  that  he 
was  the  Messiah  ?  '  He  was  bound  to  think  Messianically.'  Only, 
as  there  were  many  varieties  and  kinds  of  Messianic  conceptions 
then  current,  some  more  ethical,  others  less,  some  more  national, 
others  less,  some  more  apocalyptic,  others  less,  some  more  'super- 
natural,' others  less,  there  was  no  reason  why  Jesus  should  not 
fasten  upon  the  particular  conception  which  suited  his  own  ideas 
and  character  best,  or  which  seemed  most  in  consonance  with  his 
mission  and  his  destiny.  This  conception  he  might  himself  develop 
and  modify. 

The  point  of  departure  must  always  be  the  scene  at  Caesarea 
Philippi.  Holtzmann's  view  of  Mark  viii.  27-32  is  determinative 
for  his  whole  conception  of  the  '  Messiahship '  of  Jesus.  He  held 
himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  but  only  the  Messiah  of  Daniel  vii.  13 
— the  '  Son  of  man '  Messiah,  a  Messiah  who  would  come  upon  the 
clouds,  but  who  before  he  so  came  must  suflfer  and  die.  Holtzniann 
lays  stress  upon  the  fact  that  the  more  habitual  use  by  Jesus  of 
the  term  Son  of  man  (at  least  in  Mark)  is  in  passages  where  either 
his  suffering  or  his  future  coming  in  power  and  glory  are  referred 
to  (viii.  31,  38 ;  ix.  9,  12,  31 ;  x.  33,  45  ;  xiii.  26;  xiv.  62).  Holtz- 
mann  supposes  that  the  Son  of  man  conception  of  the  Messiah  was 
specially  suitable  to  Jesus  because  it  had  nothing  to  do  with 
nationalism,  or  political  rule,  or  a  conquering  king,  or  Davidic 
descent.  He  may,  indeed,  at  first  not  have  identified  the  Son  of 
man  with  himself.  He  was  led  to  do  so  (a)  by  the  close  connec- 
tion of  the  'Man'  with  the  'Kingdom'  which  he  (Jesus)  was  to 
inaugurate ;  and  apparently  (6)  by  being  able  in  the  '  Son  of  man 
Messiah '  to  combine  his  own  Messianic  consciousness  with  the 
growing  conviction  that  before  the  final  triumph  there  lay  defeat 
and  death. 

But  Holtzmann's  view  by  no  means  solves  every  difficulty. 
We  do  not  know  what  the  current  apocalyptic  conception  of  '  the 
Man '  exactly  was,  nor  what  was  his  exact  relation  to  the  Messiah. 
It  is  not  certain  that  Jesus  would  have  identified  himself  with  so 
mysterious  and  supernatural  a  figure.  Even  Holtzmann  admits 
that  there  is  great  difficulty  in  deciding  whether  Jesus,  in  using 
the  term,  desired  to  make  his  own  Messianic  position  and  concep- 
tion clear  or  to  keep  them  dark.  Did  he  give  a  new  meaning  to 
a  term  so  far  used  in  a  somewhat  different  sense  ?  And  did  he 
deliberately  intend  his  disciples  only  gradually  to  perceive  its 
newer  and  deeper  import  ?     A  graver  difficulty  in  Holtzmann's 


II.  23-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  103 

way  seems  to  be  that  Daniel's  Son  of  man  is  himself  by  no  means 
free  from  'national'  setting.  The  everlasting  kingdom  is  to  be 
the  kingdom  of  the  'people  of  the  saints';  in  other  words,  all 
nations  are  to  serve  the  Jews.  Then,  again,  why  should  Jesus 
have  chosen  the  Son  of  man  nomenclature,  or  clung  with  special 
intensity  to  the  Son  of  man  prophecy,  or  identified  himself  and  his 
Messiahship  with  the  Son  of  man,  when  and  because  he  realized 
that  he  must  sufifer  and  die  before  the  establishment  of  the  King- 
dom and  his  own  ultimate  triumph  ?  What  close  connection  is 
there  between  suffering  and  Son  of  man  ?  Holtzmann  does  not 
explain.  Moreover,  if  Jesus  went  to  Jerusalem  in  order  to  conquer 
and  succeed,  and  not  to  suffer  and  die,  the  whole  hypothesis  falls 
to  the  ground. 

But  Holtzmann  seems  right  in  urging  that  if  and  when  Jesus 
did  think  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  he  could  hardly  have  used 
the  term  Son  of  man  except  as  meaning  himself.  For  the  Son  of 
man  stands  too  near  to  the  Kingdom  to  be  any  other  than  the 
Messiah.  There  is  not  room  for  both  Son  of  man  and  Messiah. 
The  two  must  be  one  and  the  same.  But  a  Kingdom  without  a 
Messiah  to  bring  it  was  hardly  conceivable.  Believing  in  his 
mission  and  inspiration  as  he  did,  Jesus  was  compelled,  sooner  or 
later,  to  identify  the  Messiah  with  himself. 

On  the  whole,  perhaps,  the  soberest  and  safest  view  of  the  Son 
of  man  problem  is  that  taken  by  M.  Loisy,  who  says : 

'  However  purely  religious  and  moral  was  his  conception  of  the 
Kingdom,  Jesus  did  not  any  the  less  on  that  account  regard  him- 
self as  the  Messiah  promised  to  Israel,  and  the  future  king  of  the 
elect.  If  he  applied  to  himself,  on  very  rare  occasions,  the  titles 
of  "Son  of  God"  and  "Son  of  man,"  these  formulas  were  for  him 
but  synonyms  of  Christ,  and  we  are  the  less  authorized  to  seek  in 
them  for  special  shades  of  his  thought  and  the  personal  expression 
of  his  inmost  feelings  because  it  is  quite  possible  that  the  majority 
of  the  passages  in  which  they  occur  belong  to  the  traditional  gloss 
upon  his  teaching'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  192). 

'  If  he  sometimes  made  use  of  the  title  "Son  of  man"  borrowed 
from  Daniel,  in  order  to  apply  it  to  himself,  he  must  have  attached 
no  other  meaning  to  it  than  that  of  Messiah ;  and  it  seems  very 
hazardous  to  discover  a  special  significance  in  it,  related  to  the 
idea,  personal  also,  which  Jesus  is  supposed  to  have  formed  of  his 
mission.  Such  a  hypothesis  could  be  accepted  only  if  Jesus  had 
made  use  of  this  formula  very  frequently  or  by  preference.  Now 
it  is  the  Evangelists  who  show  the  preference,  and  its  use  by 
Jesus,  except  in  a  very  restricted  measure,  does  not  appear 
probable.  The  Evangelical  texts  seem  to  establish  a  special 
relation  between  this  title  and  the  idea  of  the  suffering  Messiah ; 


I04  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

but  the  relation  and  the  idea  belong  only  to  tradition '  {E.  8.  i. 
p.  243). 

'  The  first  generation  of  Christians  contended  with  the  Jews  on 
the  right  of  Jesus  to  the  character  of  Christ,  and  to  the  glorious 
royalty  announced  by  Daniel  in  the  famous  passage  relating  to  the 
"son  of  man,"  who  represents  and  introduces  the  reign  of  the  Saints. 
Men  were  never  weary  of  repfeating.or  of  ascribing  to  Jesus,  the  asser- 
tion that  he  was  the  "Son  of  man"  whom  Daniel  had  seen  in  spirit, 
the  Christ  of  the  parousia,  he  for  whom  the  Christians  were  always 
waiting,  and  whose  legitimate  claims  Caiaphas  had  foiled  to  recog- 
nize. The  repeated  use  of  the  title  "Son  of  man"  in  the  discourses 
of  Jesus  is  the  result  of  this  preoccupation  of  the  compilers  with 
this  idea.  The  comparison  of  the  texts  suggests  that  it  has  been 
introduced  into  the  written  tradition,  and  does  not  usually  belong 
to  the  oldest  redaction  of  the  Gospel  discourses '  (E.  S.  I.  p.  193). 

If  this  be  correct,  the  controversy  is  reduced  in  importance. 
When  Jesus  used  the  term,  which  was  not  often,  he  meant  by  it 
the  Messiah,  but  he  did  not  put  into  it  special  meanings  of  his 
own.  The  great  theologian  Hamack  also  thinks  that  Jesus  used 
the  term  occasionally  of  himself,  and  that  he  meant  by  it  the 
Messiah.  It  will  be  convenient  if  I  here  add  a  summary  of 
Harnack's  latest  view  both  of  the  Son  of  man  problem,  and,  more 
generally,  of  the  Messianic  consciousness  of  Jesus  and  of  his  con- 
ception of  the  Messiah.  This  view  is  partly  based  upon  his 
elaborate  study  of  Q.  In  his  reconstruction  of  that  document  the 
Son  of  man  occurs  some  seven  times  :  Matt.  viii.  20,  Luke  xii.  8 
(perhaps,  op.  Matt.  x.  32),  Matt.  xii.  32,  Matt.  xi.  19,  Luke  xi.  30, 
Matt.  xxiv.  44,  Matt.  xxiv.  39.  Three  or  four  of  these  passages  are 
not  connected  with  Last  Things  or  Judgment.  Clearly,  says 
Harnack,  Q  meant  by  the  term  the  Messiah.  And  the  great 
theologian  adds :  '  It  is  still  very  probable  to  me  that  the  term  in 
Jesus's  mouth  had  never  any  other  meaning.  In  each  individual 
case  where  Q  makes  Jesus  speak  of  himself  as  the  Son  of  man,  one 
cannot  be  certain  that  he  did  so.  But  that  he  did  use  the  term 
of  himself  and  to  mean  the  Messiah,  this  Q  makes  enormously 
probable'  {Spriiche  und  Reden  Jesu,  p.  166,  n.  i,  E.  T.  p.  239, 
n.  i).  The  whole  document  of  Q,  as  it  can  be  picked  out  and 
pieced  together  from  Luke  and  Matthew,  is  dominated  by  the 
theory  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah.  Harnack,  however,  thinks 
that  one  cannot  follow  the  compiler  of  Q  the  whole  way.  One 
must  remove  the  Messianic  consciousness  implied  in  the  story  of 
the  baptism  and  the  temptation.  One  must  neglect  the  use  of 
'the  Son  of  man'  in  the  earlier  period  of  the  ministry.  If  one  does 
this,  then  one  can  obtain  from  Q  a  very  early  conception  of  Jesus 
which,  as  Hamack  thinks,  is  historic  and  accurate.     I  will  quote 


11.23-28]  THE  GOSPEL  ACOORDINQ  TO  MABK  I  OS 

Harnack's  own  words,  but  before  I  do  so  I  would  like  to  point  out 
that  those  words  are  controlled  by  the,  as  I  believe,  unhistorical 
theory  that  Jesus  felt  himself  to  be  (of  course  only  in  a  spiritual 
and  moral  sense)  the  special  Son  of  God,  with  a  knowledge  of  God 
and  a  realization  of  sonship  such  as  none  had  possessed  or  felt 
before  him.  Hence  Harnack's  desperate  efforts  to  maintain  the 
authenticity  of  Matt.  xi.  25-30.  The  c^onsciousness  of  sonship  was 
earlier  than  the  consciousness  of  Messiahship.  The  first  was  the 
preparation  for  the  second.  For  the  consciousness  of  Messiahship 
never  meant  anything  else  than  a  consciousness  of  something 
which  he  would  become.  Hence  the  consciousness  of  what  he  was 
had  to  precede  the  consciousness  of  what  he  was  going  to  be,  and 
only  if  this  prior  consciousness  had  reached  the  height  of  the 
'  Sohnesbewusstsein '  could  it  have  formed  the  bridge  to  the 
consciousness  of  Messianity. 

The  notes  on  Matt.  xi.  25-30  will  show  how  doubtful  this 
whole  theory  is,  and  on  what  slender  support  it  rests.  And, 
indeed,  a  Jewish  admirer  of  Jesus  cannot  help  hoping  that  he 
never  believed  that  no  pious  Jew  in  his  own  age  or  before  him 
had  a  sense  or  a  knowledge  of  God  equal  to  his  own.  To  a  Jewish 
mind,  if  Jesus  believed  that  he  was  nearer  to  God  and  felt  God 
nearer  to  him  than  other  men,  such  a  belief  would  have  meant 
that  he  was  in  truth  removed  from  Him.  Jesus,  like  the  prophets 
of  old,  may,  indeed,  have  believed  that  his  teaching  was  inspired 
and  indubitably  right.  Such  certainty  is  not  inconsistent  with 
humility.  He  may  have  regarded  obedience  to  his  commands  as 
equivalent  to  the  doing  of  God's  will,  but  his  Jewish  admirers  will 
cling  to  the  hope  that  he  did  not  believe  that  he  was  a  better, 
wiser  man,  with  a  fuller  knowledge  of  God,  than  anybody  who  had 
ever  lived.  And  this  is  what  Harnack's  view  of  him  seems  to 
imply.  The  true  Jesus  is,  one  hopes,  better  revealed  in  the  humility 
of  Mark  x.  1 8  than  in  the  self-assertion  of  Matt.  xi.  2^.  However 
this  may  be,  the  following  is  the  great  theologian's  view  as  to  the 
development  of  Jesus's  conception  of  his  Messiahship,  which,  as  he 
thinks,  Q  either  reveals  or  does  not  contradict.  It  is,  in  fact, 
deduced  from  both  Mark  and  Q,  and  thus  has  the  greater  claim 
to  be  regarded  as  accurate  and  historical :  '  We  now  have  before 
us  a  compilation  of  sayings  in  which  the  speaker  is  a  teacher, 
a  prophet,  one  who  is  more  than  a  prophet — the  final  decisive 
Messenger  of  God;  but  so  surely  as  he  demands  unconditional 
obedience  to  His  commands,  in  which  the  will  of  God  is  expressed, 
and  calls  upon  men  to  follow  Him,  so  little  does  He  do  this  with 
the  expressed  self- witness:  'I  am  the  Messiah.'  Rather  He  points 
simply  to  His  miracles  and  His  works  (in  so  far  as  He  does  not 
count  upon  the  self-evidence  of  His  commands  in  their  appeal  to 


I06  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [II.  23-28 

the  hearts  of  His  hearers).  If  one  therefore  neglects  the  term 
'  Son  of  man ' — which  was  certainly  used  by  our  Lord,  though  we 
cannot  be  sure  that  it  is  genuine  in  any  particular  saying — Jesus 
first  asserts  His  claim  to  the  Messiahship  in  the  sayings  at  the 
close  of  the  source,  but  only  in  connection  with  and  under  tfie 
imagery  of  the  Second  Coming ;  He  who  already  in  His  present 
state  of  existence  is  more  than  a  prophet  and  greater  than  John, 
He  who  is  the  Son,  will  be  the  coming  King  and  Judge. 

'Critical  investigation  of  the  accounts  in  St  Mark  seems  to 
compel  us  to  the  conclusion  that  our  Lord  during  the  first  and 
longest  period  of  His  ministry  does  not  speak  of  Himself  as  the 
Messiah  (because  He  at  first  neither  regarded  Himself  as  Messiah, 
nor  indeed  could  so  regard  Himself)  and  even  rejected  the  title  of 
Messiahship  when  it  was  applied  to  Himself,  but  that,  on  the 
other  hand,  He  was  possessed  by  the  strongest  conviction  that  as 
a  messenger  of  God  He  was  entrusted  with  a  mission  of  decisive 
import,  and  that  He  knew  God  as  none  other  knew  Him — a  con- 
viction to  which  He  again  and  again  gave  expression ;  and  that  at 
a  later  period  after  He  had  accepted  at  Csesarea  Philippi  the 
confession  of  the  disciples  :  "  Thou  art  the  Messiah  " — i.e.  "  Thou 
wilt  be  He,"  He  from  henceforth  (though  indeed  still  with  reserve 
until  the  entry  into  Jerusalem)  called  Himself  the  son  of  man, 
and  with  growing  confidence  proclaimed  His  Parousia,  i.e.  His 
Messiahship.  There  is  nothing  in  the  compilation  of  discourses 
in  Q,  if  only  we  neglect  the  introduction,  which  can  be  alleged  to 
be  discrepant  with  this  picture  of  gradual  development.  We  can- 
not, it  must  also  be  acknowledged,  derive  from  Q  certain  testimony 
to  the  detailed  accuracy  of  this  picture,  because  Q  pays  such  sUght 
regard  to  chronology ;  nevertheless  Q  also  bears  witness  to  the 
main  position,  in  that  in  the  sayings  collected  in  Q  the  Messiah- 
ship  is  only  clearly  expressed  under  the  form  of  the  Parousia,  and 
in  that  in  these  sayings  our  Lord  claims  faith  not  because  He  is 
the  present  Messiah — this  is  unthinkable — but  because  He  works 
the  works  of  God  and  proclaims  His  Commandments '  (Sayings  of 
Jesus,  English  edition,  p.  244,  original  German,  p.  169).  It  should 
be  distinctly  stated  that  the  use  of  'our  Lord'  in  the  English 
version  is  no  exact  translation  of  the  German.  Harnack  simply 
says  Jesus.  Again,  where  the  English  version  has  St  Mark,  St 
Matthew,  &c.,  Harnack  has  simply  Mark  and  Matthew.  The 
English  capital  H's  iu  the  pronouns,  '  he,'  '  his,'  &c.,  when  these 
pronouns  refer  to  Jesus,  are  also  no  feature  of  the  German 
original 


III.  i^]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  107 


CHAPTER  III 

1-6.    Healing  on  the  Sabbath 
(Gp.  Matt.  xii.  9-14;  Luke  vi.  6-1 1) 

1  And  he  entered  on  another  occasion  into  the  synagogue;  and 

2  there  was  a  man  there  who  had  a  withered  hand.  And  they  kept 
watching  him,  to  see  whether  he  would  heal  him  on  the  sabbath 

3  day ;  so  that  they  might  accuse  him.     And  he  said  unto  the  man 

4  who  had  the  withered  hand, '  Stand  up  and  come  forward.'  And 
he  said  unto  them,  'Is  it  permitted  to  do  good  on  the  sabbath 
rather  than  to  do  evil  ?   to  save  life  rather  than  to  kill  it?'     But 

5  they  held  their  peace.  And  he  looked  round  on  them  with  anger, 
being  grieved  for  the  hardness  of  their  hearts,  and  he  said  unto  the 
man,  '  Stretch  out  thine  hand.'     And  he  stretched  it  out :  and  his 

6  hand  was  restored.  And  the  Pharisees  went  out,  and  straightway 
took  counsel  with  the  Herodians  against  him,  how  they  might 
destroy  him. 

The  fifth  '  conflict.'  For  the  Rabbinic  laws  in  regard  to  sick- 
ness and  surgical  operations  upon  the  Sabbath,  see  Additional 
Note  13.  As  with  the  other  'conflicts,'  so  of  this  one,  Loisy 
supposes  that  it  goes  back  to  some  earlier  written  source.  See  the 
quotation  from  Vol.  I.  p.  87  at  the  beginning  of  Chapter  II.  The 
conclusion  of  the  story  before  us  was  originally  intended  (see  note 
below)  to  prepare  us  tor  the  denouement  of  Jesus's  career :  neither 
story  nor  conclusion  was  intended  to  occupy  this  particular  place 
in  the  source  from  which  the  redactor  has  taken  them  (p.  88). 

I.  Had  the  narrative  in  I  Kings  xiii.  4-6  any  influence  upon 
the  growth  or  wording  of  this  story  ?  So,  long  ago,  thought 
Strauss  in  his  Lehen  Jesu  (Vol.  11.  p.  125,  ed.  i). 

2.  It  seems  somewhat  unnecessary  to  assume,  as  Prof  Bennett 
does  {Life  of  Jesus  according  to  St  Mark,  p.  40),  that  the  whole 
incident  had  been  arranged  by  the  Pharisees,  that  '  they  chose  a 
Sabbath  when  Jesus  would  be  in  the  synagogue,  and  arranged 
that  there  should  be  present  a  man  with  a  withered  Land ;  they 
themselves  also  attended  to  see  what  Jesus  would  do,' 


Io8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [III.  i-6 

4.  The  meaning  seems  to  be  :  '  On  the  Sabbath  day  should 
one  not  rather  do  good  than  evil,  rather  save  a  life  than  kill  it  ? ' 

To  heal  is  regarded  as  an  instance  of  doing  good.  Thus  not 
to  heal  is  equivalent  to  doing  evil,  for  if  the  life  is  not  saved,  it 
is  killed. 

But  the  reasoning  of  Jesus  seems  to  be  casuistical.  More  than 
once  it  seems  as  if  he  wished  to  win  a  dialectical  victory  without 
really  meeting  the  objections  squarely.  He  seems  to  evade  the 
argument  by  a  counter  argument,  which,  however  ingenious,  is 
not  really  to  the  point.  Sometimes,  too,  it  seems  as  if  he  would 
not  give  a  straight  answer  to  a  straight  question,  but  sought  to 
elude  the  question  by  an  ingenious  parry.  How  far  these  evasions 
and  dialectical  puzzles  are  historical,  and  how  far,  if  so,  they  were 
morally  justifiable,  are  difiScult  points.  Jesus  seems  to  take  the 
line  that  the  questioners  were  insincere,  and  only  sought  to 
entrap  him.  He  was  therefore  justified  in  avoiding  their  snares 
by  puzzles,  counter  problems,  and  evasions.  He  is  only  frank  to 
those  who  are  frank. 

The  casuistry  here  is  that  it  could  not  be  argued  that  the  man 
with  the  'withered  hand'  was  in  any  danger  of  his  life.  The 
healing  could  very  well  have  been  put  off  till  the  morrow,  had 
Jesus  been  so  minded.  Yet,  even  though  there  was  no  question 
of  life  or  death,  Jesus  thought  himself  justified  in  not  postponing 
the  cure.  Apparently  his  real  view  was  that  any  good  action,  or 
any  kind  of  healing,  should  not  be  postponed  for  the  sake  of  the 
Sabbath.  This  view  would  lead,  if  pushed  home,  to  very  wide 
consequences.  The  truth  is  that  each  case  must  be  judged  upon 
its  own  merits. 

Assuming,  as  I  do,  that  miracles,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the 
word,  were  not  wrought  by  Jesus,  the  question  arises :  Does  the 
sudden  healing  of  a  withered  arm  fall  within  or  without  the  limits 
of  the  possible  ? 

5.  Note  the  strong  expression  'with  anger.'  He  considers 
their  heart  hard  because  they  do  not  believe  in  him  and  recognize 
the  force  of  his  argument.  Of  course  the  Evangelist  tells  the 
story,  like  all  his  other  stories,  to  make  all  our  sympathies  go 
with  Jesus,  and  to  put  the  Pharisees  in  the  worst  possible  hght. 
Hardness  of  heart  does  not  mean  callousness  of  feeling,  but 
unsusceptibility  of  mind.  'The  Pharisees  were  "hardened"  by 
previous  conceptions  against  his  new  truth'  (Gould).  The  two 
parties  could  not  understand  each  other.  Their  point  of  view  was 
different.  Jesus  could  not  understand  them;  they  could  not 
understand  him ;  and  so  each  was  unjust  to  the  other.  Here,  as 
always,  the  words  of  Jowett  are  true  and  in  point:  '  We  only  learn 


III.  1-6]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  109 

the  true  lesson  to  be  gathered '  from  these  stories  '  when  we  place 
ourselves  above  them.'  We  must  be  independent  before  we  can 
be  just ;  or,  in  other  words,  before  we  can  draw  near  to  the  truth. 

6.  The  Herodians  were  the  adherents  of  Herod  Antipas,  the 
tetrarch  of  Galilee.  'They  are  no  regular  party,  but  they  are 
the  government  men,  who,  like  Herod  himself,  are  afraid  of  every 
movement '  (W.).     Loisy  thinks  they  are  Herod's  functionaries. 

Considering  that  Professor  Burkitt  believes  that  Mark  is  not 
'  based  on  older  literary  sources,'  and  that  it  was  not  written  till 
thirty  or  forty  years  after  the  crucifixion,  it  is  somewhat  remark- 
able how  much  accuracy  he  assigns  to  it.  The  statement  in  iii.  6 
is  quite  historic,  he  supposes.  At  that  very  point  the  Pharisees 
and  the  government  men  did  plan  how  they  might  get  rid  of 
Jesus.  It  seems  difficult  to  suppose  that  this  bloodthirsty  intention 
existed  so  early.  Are  there  adequate  grounds  for  believing  that 
the  Pharisees  and  the  '  bureaucracj' '  joined  hands  at  this  stage, 
or  that  either  were  embittered  enough  against  Jesus  to  concert 
together  for  hia  death  ?  We  may  try  to  get  over  the  difficulty  by 
saying  that  this  story  really  occurred  at  the  close  of  the  Galilaean 
ministry  (so  B.  Weiss).  Or  we  may  take  the  line  of  J.  Weiss  who 
does  not  regard  iii.  6  as  accurate  for  this  special  moment.  Mark, 
as  it  were,  sums  up  the  inevitable  conclusion  from  the  antagonism 
between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisees.  Who  were  guilty  of  Jesus's 
death  ?  Mark  answers :  the  Pharisees,  as  the  representatives  of 
orthodox  legal  Judaism,  and  the  Herodians,  as  the  opponents  of 
everyone  who  might  be  dangerous  to  Herod's  house.  Loisy  takes 
much  the  same  line.  '  It  is  probable  that  the  stories  which  have 
just  been  narrated,  the  object  of  which  is  to  show  the  objections 
raised  against  Jesus  by  the  Pharisees  on  the  subject  of  the 
Sabbath,  partially  at  any  rate  anticipate  the  events  which  are 
now  to  follow.  One  can  easily  imagine  that  the  believers  in  the 
gospel,  in  relating  the  dealings  of  Jesus  with  the  rigorists  among 
the  Jews,  should  have  grouped  together  a  certain  number  of 
anecdotes  about  the  Sabbath,  ending  in  this  conclusion :  thus  the 
Pharisees  began  to  dislike  Jesus  and  resolved  to  destroy  him. 
The  conclusion  is  relative  rather  to  the  whole  series  of  stories 
than  to  this  one  in  particular :  it  indicates  the  final  denouement  of 
the  struggle  entered  into  by  Jesus  against  the  Pharisaic  spirit. 
Nevertheless  it  may  be  said  that  this  conclusion  would  be  better 
motived  and  more  in  place,  if  it  came  after  some  utterance 
denoting  the  Messianic  pretensions  of  Jesus.  For  it  was  this 
which  might  cause  disquietude  to  Herod  and  his  partisans,  to 
whom  the  Pharisees,  who  were  no  friends  of  theirs,  would  not  have 
resorted  unless  confronted  by  a  common  danger'  {E.  S.  1.  p.  519). 


I  lO  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [III.  i-6 

But  from  iii.  6,  according  to  Professor  Burkitt, '  a  new  era  in  the 
ministry  is  opened.'  Here  is  the  '  final  rupture  with  the  religious 
authorities  in  Galilee.  No  longer  does  Jesus  preach  in  the  syna- 
gogues, except  once  (and  that  unsuccessfully)  in  his  own  home  at 
Nazareth.  His  aim  is  no  longer  the  rousing  of  the  multitudes, 
as  it  had  been  hitherto,  but  the  instruction  and  training  of  his 
own  disciples.  He  now  begins  to  organise  his  followers  into  an 
organisation  which  was  destined  to  develop  into  the  Christian 
Church '  (op.  cit.  pp.  68,  6g,  8 1 ).  vi.  34  is  exceptional  (is  vii.  14 
also  ?).  Thus  Professor  Burkitt  regards  the  call  of  the  twelve  and 
the  despatch  of  them  upon  missionary  work  as  strictly  historic, 
whereas  W.  calls  it  in  question.  To  the  one  distinguished  scholar, 
even  the  mountain  of  iii.  13  is  historic;  to  the  other,  the  passage 
which  13  opens  (13-19)  is  a  later  editorial  insertion. 


7-12.    Many  Healings 
{Op.  Matt.  xii.  15-21;  Luke  vi.  17-19) 

7  But  Jesus  with  his  disciples  retired  to  the  lake ;  and  a  great 

8  multitude  from  Galilee  followed  him ;  and  from  Judaea,  and  from 
Jerusalem,  and  from  Idumsea,  and  beyond  Jordan,  and  about  Tyre 
and  Sidon,  a  great  multitude,  who  had  heard  what  great  things  he 

9  did,  came  unto  him.  And  he  told  his  disciples  to  have  a  boat 
ready  for  him,  so  that  he  ftiight  not  be  crushed  by  the  crowd. 

10  For  he  had  healed  many,  so  that  all  who  were  afflicted  pressed 

11  upon  him  in  order  to  touch  him.     And  the  unclean  spirits,  when 
they  saw  him,  fell  down  before  him,  and  screamed,  saying, '  Thou 

12  art  the  Son  of  God.'     And  he  rebuked  them  much  that  they 
should  not  make  him  known. 

From  here  till  viii.  26  it  is  not  easy  to  discern  the  plan  or 
framework  upon  which  Mark  has  arranged  his  material.  '  La  plus 
grande  confusion  regne  dans  le  rdcit.'  The  present  section  may 
have  been  drawn  up  by  Mark  to  prepare  for  the  dispute  (in 
iii.  20-30)  about  the  source  from  which  Jesus  draws  his  power  of 
exorcism. 

The  crowds  from  distant  parts,  the  inconvenient  pressure,  and 
the  charges  to  the  unclean  spirits,  must  all  be  taken  with  many 
grains  of  critical  salt  in  order  to  reduce  the  incidents  here  spoken 
of  to  their  real  historical  proportions.  Jesus's  commandment  to 
the  unclean  spirits  not  to  make  him  known,  with  their  instant 


III.  7-12]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  III 

recognition  of  him  as  the  Son  of  God,  are  part  and  parcel  of 
Mark's  theology  and  scheme.  Mark  is  not  by  any  means  the 
mere  simple  narrator.  He  has  a  theology  which  the  facts  must 
be  expanded,  modified,  and  interpreted  to  suit. 

7.  dv€-)(a)pr)crep.  Mark  seems  to  imply  that  Jesus  seeks  to 
avoid  useless  disputes  with  his  adversaries.  He  no  longer  preaches 
in  the  synagogues. 

II.  When  Mark  says  that  the  unclean  spirits  fell  down  before 
Jesus,  he  of  course  means  that  the  men  who  were  supposed  to  be 
possessed  with  these  '  spirits '  fell  down.  '  Son  of  God.'  '  This 
title  was  a  Messianic  title,  denoting  theocratic  sonship,  and  there 
is  nothing  here  to  indicate  that  it  is  used  in  any  other  than  this 
common  sense'  (Gould).  For  the  phrase,  see  Carpenter,  First 
Three  Gospels,  pp.  76-81. 

There  is  no  good  and  convincing  evidence  that  Son  of  God 
was  a  current  Messianic  title  at  the  time  of  Jesus,  but,  neverthe- 
less, it  is  quite  likely  that  such  was  to  some  extent  the  case. 
Israel  had  been  called  God's  sou  for  a  long  while,  and  the  great 
kings,  such  as  David  and  Solomon,  had  also  been  metaphorically  so 
called.  The  '  Son '  in  Psalm  ii.  was  interpreted  (perhaps  rightly) 
to  be  the  Messiah,  and  here  we  find  the  famous  phrase:  'Thou 
art  my  Son ;  this  day  I  have  begotten  thee.'  If  Jesus  was  called 
Son  of  God  while  he  lived,  he  was  called  so  as  being  the  Messiah, 
not  in  any  metaphysical  sense.  He  could  be  man,  Messiah,  and 
Son  of  God  in  one.  But  the  pre-existence  of  the  Messiah  in  heaven 
had  also  become  a  floating  Jewish  conception  by  this  time.  If 
the  Messiah  was  pre-existent,  he  was  semi-divine,  or  angelic,  and 
this  is  the  conception  which  Paul  had  of  him,  perhaps  even  before 
he  identified  the  Messiah  with  Jesus.  To  Mark,  the  Messiah  Jesus 
was  no  mere  man.  He  was  probably  already  regarded  by  Mark 
as  divine,  though  that  might  not  prevent  him  having  been  born 
upon  earth  of  a  human  father  and  a  human  mother.  Paul  and 
the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  seem  either  not  to  know  of  the 
virgin  birth  or  not  to  accept  it.  Another  early  conception  was 
that  Jesus  only  became  Son  of  God  in  any  real  sense  at  his 
ascension.  He  was  the  Messiah,  but  his  Messiahship  was  latent. 
He  was  made  and  appointed  Messiah  and  Son  of  God  by  his 
resurrection  and  ascension.  '  God  has  made  him  both  Lord  and 
Messiah,  this  Jesus  whom  ye  crucified'  (Acts  ii.  36).  And  Paul 
says  that  Jesus  was  '  declared  (or  appointed)  to  be  the  Son  of 
God  in  power  by  his  resurrection  (Romans  i.  4)-  That  Jesus 
regarded  himself  as  divine  or  semi-divine  is  improbable.  He 
would,  at  most,  only  have  acknowledged  himself  to  be  'Son  of 


112  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [III.  7-12 

God'  in  a  simpler  Messianic  sense,  or  he  may  have  believed, 
towards  the  end  of  his  ministry,  that  he  would  be  transformed 
into  a  higher  kind  of  being  (the  '  heavenly  man ')  after  his  death. 


13-19.    The  Twelve  Apostles 
(Cp.  Matt.  X.  2-4;  Luke  vi.  12-16) 

13  And  he  went  up  on  to  the  mountain,  and  called   unto  him 

14  whom  he  desired ;  and  they  came  unto  him.     And  he  appointed 

15  twelve  to  be  with  him,  and  to  send  them  forth  to  preach,  and  to 

16  have  power  to  cast  out  demons.    So  he  appointed  the  Twelve,  and 

17  Simon  he  surnamed  Peter.     And  (he  appointed)  James  the  son  of 
Zebedee,  and  John   the   brother  of  James,  whom  he  surnamed 

18  Boanerges,  which  is,  sons  of  thunder,  and  Andrew,  and  Philip,  and 
Bartholomew,  and  Matthew,  and  Thomas,  and  James  the  son  of 

19  Alphseus,  and  Thaddeus,  and  Simon  the   Canaanite,  and  Judas 
Iscariot,  who  betrayed  him. 

Disciples  are  mentioned  before  this  section.  An  inner  ring  is 
now  specially  marked  out.  The  vocation  or  purpose  of  the  Twelve 
seems  here  anticipated  from  vi.  7,  to  which  place  Matthew  relegates 
the  whole  incident.  Perhaps  it  is,  as  Loisy  says,  introduced  here 
to  prepare  for  the  saying  of  Jesus  about  his  true  relations 
(,E.  S.  I.  p.  89). 

As  to  the  names,  Boanerges  is  etymologically  obscure:  see 
Luke  ix.  54.  Iscariot  is  also  of  doubtful  signification.  Andrew 
and  Philip  are  purely  Greek  names. 

W.  observes, '  Es  versteht  sich  von  selbst  dass  die  Beilegung 
von  Beinamen  wie  Kepha  und  Boanerges  nicht  abrupt  geschehen 
kann  und  kein  historischer  Akt  ist.'  But  is  there  reason  to  deny 
that  Jesus  may,  on  some  occasion  and  for  some  reason  or  other, 
have  given  these  new  and  extra  names  to  these  particular  men  ? 

Where  is  Levi,  so  prominently  mentioned  in  ii.  14  ?  It  cannot 
be  assumed  offhand  that  he  is  identical  with  Matthew,  though 
the  first  Gospel  makes  this  identification  and  it  is  generally 
accepted.     See  note  on  Matt.  ix.  9. 

W.  thinks  that  both  iii.  7-12  and  13-19  are  "editorial  ad- 
ditions' (Redaktionsstucke).  13-19  he  calls  'statistics  in  the  form 
of  historic  narrative.'  He  points  out  that  iii.  20-30  and  31-35 
join  on  well  with  the  group  of  stories  in  ii.  i-iii.  6.  Perhaps,  he 
adds,  7-12  should  really  be  placed  immediately  before  iv.  1-9- 


III.  13-19]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 13 

The  situation  points  to  this :  Jesus  is  by  the  lake  with  a  multitude 
pressing  about  him ;  a  boat  is  got  ready  for  him.  Whereas  in 
the  present  arrangement  the  boat  ordered  in  iii.  9  is  not  used ; 
Jesus  goes  up  a  mountain,  and  afterwards  returns  to  Capernaum. 
But  in  iv.  i  he  really  embarks  on  the  boat  which  has  been  ready 
for  him  since  iii.  9, 

The  functions  of  the  Twelve  are  succinctly  described,  and  may 
be  regarded  as  repeating  and  confirming  Mark's  view  of  the 
Master's  own  mission :  (a)  proclamation  of  the  coming  Kingdom ; 
(b)  the  expulsion  of  demons.  When  and  how  the  Twelve  were 
chosen  may  not  have  been  precisely  known  to  the  Evangelist.  Of 
the  fact  of  the  '  college '  of  Twelve  he  knew,  and  he  wanted  to 
date,  localize  and  describe  its  institution.  The  persons  referred 
to  in  verse  13  as  going  up  to  Jesus  into  the  mountain  are  the 
Twelve.  The  choice  of  the  apostles  prepares  and  explains  the 
saying  in  verse  35. 

J.  Weiss,  in  an  excellent  and  elaborate  note,  comes  to  much 
the  same  conclusions  as  W.  Jesus  must  have  had  an  inner  and 
outer  circle  of  disciples :  but  whether  at  any  given  moment,  or 
even  early  in  his  ministry,  the  inner  circle  was  fixed  at  twelve 
is  extremely  doubtful.  Loisy  thinks  that  the  Twelve  are  his- 
torical. The  number  is  symbolic,  yet  'il  ne  laisse  pas  d'etre 
historique.'  Jesus  chooses  twelve  men,  because  his  message  is 
to  the  Jews,  and  he  means  to  preach  the  gospel  to  them  only 
{E.  8. 1,  pp.  528,  208,  209).  The  list  of  the  'Twelve  is  given,  with 
variations  of  detail,  in  Mark,  Matthew,  and  Luke.  'Ihe  Greek 
names  Andrew  and  Philip  would  imply  that  Hellenistic  or  Hellen- 
istically  inclined  Jews  were  from  the  first  among  the  disciples 
of  Jesus.  J.  Weiss  thinks  it  is  not  inconceivable  that  Jesus  may 
have  understood  Greek,  or  even  have  spoken  it.  Why  and  when 
Jesus  gave  to  Simon  his  surname  Peter  (or  Rock)  is  obscure. 
'Eine  unbeugsame  Felsennatur  scheint  Petrus  gerade  nicht  ge- 
wesen  zu  sein.'  'The  name  of  Peter,  taking  into  consideration 
the  way  in  which  Mark  introduces  it,  means  what  Matthew 
subsequently  states :  Simon,  the  first  disciple  that  Jesus  enlisted, 
becomes  the  head  stone  of  the  apostolic  college  and  of  the  society 
which  is  to  be  formed  for  the  Kingdom  of  God '  {E.  S.  i.  p.  529). 
But  this  seems  to  give  the  name  an  explanation,  which  in  Jesus's 
mouth  is  unlikely.  If  there  are  Petrine  reminiscences  in  Mark, 
there  ought  hardly  to  be  this  uncertainty  about  the  Twelve. 
Might  not  Peter  have  explained  the  meaning  of  his  own  surname  ? 
J.  Weiss  can  only  suppose  that  Peter  did  not  'think  it  worth 
while'  to  tell.     But  could  not  Mark  have  asked  him? 


114  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [III.  20-30 

20-30.    Attack  and  Defence 
(Gp.  Matt.  ix.  32-34,  xii.  22-32,  36,  37 ;  Luke  xi.  14-23,  xii.  10) 

20  And  he  went  into  an  house.     And  a  crowd  collected  together 

21  again,  so  that  they  could  not  even  eat  bread.  And  when  his 
relatives  heard  of  these  things,  they  set  forth  to  lay  hold  of  him ; 
for  they  said,  '  He  is  out  of  his  mind.' 

22  And  the  scribes  who  came  from  Jerusalem  said,  'He  has 
Beelzebul,  and  by  the  ruler  of  the  demons  he  casts  out  demons.' 

23  And  he  called  them  unto  him,  and  said  unto  them  by  way  of 

24  parable, '  How  can  Satan  cast  out  Satan  ?    And  if  a  kingdom  be 

25  divided  against  itself,  that  kingdom  cannot  endure.     And  if  a 

26  house  be  divided  against  itself,  that  house  cannot  endure.  And  if 
Satan  rise  up  against  himself,  and  be  divided,  he  cannot  endure, 

27  but  Cometh  to  an  end.  No  man  can  enter  into  a  strong  man's 
house,  and  plunder  his  goods,  unless  he  first  bind  the  strong  man; 

28  and  then  he  can  plunder  his  house.  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  All  the 
sins  and  blasphemies  wherewith  the  sons  of  men  blaspheme,  shall 

29  be  forgiven  them,  but  he  that  blasphemeth  against  the  Holy  Spirit 

30  hath  no  forgiveness  for  ever,  but  is  guilty  of  eternal  sin.'  Because 
they  said, '  He  has  an  unclean  spirit.' 

This  paragraph  opens  with  the  beginning  of  the  story  about 
Jesus's  family  and  how  they  seek  to  put  him  under  restraint. 
But  the  story  is  no  sooner  begun  than  it  is  suddenly  interrupted 
by  another  story  (22-30),  so  that  the  original  tale  is  not  resumed 
till  31.  The  true  explanation  of  these  phenomena  is  not  by  any 
means  certain.  In  one  other  place  Mark  has  a  story  within  a 
story,  but  there  the  interposed  story  is  inserted  with  propriety, 
and  even  with  artistic  effect.  Here,  on  the  contrary,  it  would 
seem  that  there  is  a  real  interpolation.  At  what  stage  did  it 
arise,  and  whence  was  it  taken  ?  W.  regards  it  as  an  insertion, 
but  nevertheless  quite  independent  as  compared  with  the  corre- 
sponding sections  in  Matthew  and  Luke.  We  have  still  to 
consider  it  as  the  work  of  Mark.  Loisy,  on  the  other  hand,  while 
also  holding  that  it  is  an  insertion,  supposes  that  it  is  borrowed 
from  Q.  '  Marc  a  dfl  la  prendre  a  la  source  oh.  Matthieu  et  Luc 
I'ont  emprunt^e'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  88).  And  finally,  Dr  Carpenter  says' 
that  'it  is  practically  certain  that  verses  22-30  have  been  introduced 
from  Matthew  and  Luke.'     In  that  case  the  insertion  would  have 


111.2(3-30]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  II 5 

no  bearing  upon  the  question :  Did  Mark  know  Q  ?  Of  course 
B.  Weiss  holds  that  the  narrative  in  Q  which  is  preserved  best  by 
Luke  is  older  than,  and  has  been  used  by,  Mark  {Quellen,  A, 
pp.  11S-118). 

20.  The  story  of  Jesus's  family  is  awkwardly  hooked  on  at 
this  point  and  given  an  awkward  setting.  It  was  not  because 
Jesus  was  unable  to  take  his  food  on  account  of  the  crowd  that 
his  family  said  he  was  mad.  What  his  family  hear  about  is  his 
preaching  and  his  miracles :  but  when  they  arrive  from  Nazareth 
they  are  made  to  find  the  circumstances  stated  in  verse  20. 
Assuming  that  Mark  knew  Q,  it  would  certainly  seem  as  if  he 
had  deliberately  omitted  the  occasion  for  the  dispute  and  dis- 
cussion of  22-30  recorded  by  Matthew  (xii.  22)  and  substituted 
for  it  the  opening  of  the  story  about  the  family,  with  the  words 
iXeyov  oTi  i^eart], '  They  said  he  was  beside  himself.'  The  miracle 
recorded  in  Matt.  xii.  22  is  a  far  more  natural  prelude  for  the 
dispute  than  what  we  now  find  in  Mark. 

21.  oi  Trap'  axnov.  Not  'his  friends,' but  'his  relatives.'  The 
same  people  are  referred  to  as  in  31-35.  The  S.S.  has  'his 
brothers,'  which  Merx  regards  as  original.  By  inserting  22-30 
between  21  and  31  Mark  provides  a  tolerable,  but  unoriginal, 
connection  for  the  charge  of  the  Scribes.  His  relations  say,  'He 
is  mad ' :  the  Scribes  say,  '  He  has  Beelzebul.'  His  madness  is  a 
demoniac  possession.  M.  Loisy  says  that  i^ea-TJ]  does  not  mean 
'  he  is  mad '  (in  the  ordinary  sense  of  '  mad '),  but  that  he  is  in  a 
state  of  '  exaltation  mystique  qui  lui  fait  perdre  le  sens  reel  de 
la  vie  et  de  sa  propre  condition '  {E.  S.  l.  p.  698). 

22.  J,  Weiss  points  out  that  the  two  charges  in  verse  22  are 
not  quite  the  same.  The  first  says :  Jesus  is  possessed ;  he  is  the 
devil's  slave.  The  second  says :  He  is  the  devil's  partner  or  ally. 
In  Jesus's  reply,  verse  27  specially  refers  to  the  view  that  he  is 
possessed,  the  devil's  slave.  This  charge  is  ridiculous,  for  how 
could  he  who  has  overcome  the  devil  be  himself  the  devil's  slave  ? 

Beelzebul  means  '  Lord  of  the  dwelling ' ;  the  variant  Beelzebub 
means  '  Lord  of  the  flies,'  and  is  mentioned  in  2  Kings  i.  2  as  a 
god  of  the  Philistines.  We  have  to  assume  that  Beelzebul  must 
have  been  one  of  the  current  names  or  by-names  of  Satan  or  the 
devU, 

The  appearance  of  the  Scribes  from  Jerusalem  is  very  sudden. 
They  speak  as  if  they  had  appeared  before  and  were  already  known. 
Luke,  as  W.  points  out,  puts  '  some  people,'  which  is  more  likely  to 
be  correct.    '  The  description  of  the  precise  people  addressed  is,  as 

8—2 


Il6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [111.20-30 

in  otber  cases,  aft  addition.  Jesus  in  tmth  had  not  bo  exclusively 
to  deal  with  Scribes  and  Pharisees.'  On  the  otha:  hand,  M.  Loi^ 
says :  '  There  is  nothing  surprising  in  the  fact  thaft  there  gathered 
round  the  Saviour  some  Scribes  from  the  capital,  either  drawn 
thither  by  a  sentiment  of  personal  curiosity,  or  possibly  come 
with  a  commission  to  observe  the  movement  which  was  taking 
shape  in  Galilee'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  698).  In  this  passage  the  Jerusalem 
Rabbis  are  introduced  as  even  exceeding  in  their  enmity  tiie 
opponents  of  u.-iii.  6 ;  they  are  the  most  poisonous  specimens  of 
the  viper's  teood  (Matt,  xxiii.  33). 

23.  The  argument  is  simple.  Satan  would  not  expel  Satan. 
None  of  Satan's  lieutenants  would  expel  him.  (A  sort  of  a  king- 
dom of  demons  is  assumed  under  the  presidency  of  a  chief.)  If  a 
demon  is  expelled  from  a  man,  it  must  be  by  a  power  which  (a)  is 
wholly  other  than,  and  opposed  to,  Satan's,  and  (6)  is  superior  in 
strength  to  his  strength. 

24,  25.  Two  examples  or  parables  illustrate  the  main  conten- 
tion. No  empire  or  house  divided  against  itself  can  endure. 
It  must  fall  to  pieces.  So  if  Satan's  kingdom  or  power  were 
divided  against  itself,  it  could  not  endure. 

26.  The  wording  ought  to  be :  If  Satan  were  divided  against 
himself,  he  would  not  be  able  to  stand,  but  he  would  come  to  an 
end.  But  instead  of  that  we  have :  '  If  Satan  is  divided  against 
himself,  he  is  not  able  to  stand,  but  he  comes  to  an  end.'  The 
reason  for  this  logical  inexactitude  is  that  as  a  matter  of  fact 
Satan  is  coming  to  an  end,  though  for  a  different  reason.  The 
reason  is  given  in  the  second  parable,  in  the  next  verse.  Satan's 
power  is  falling,  not  because  there  is  division  in  the  Satanic  king- 
dom, but  because  Satan  has  encountered  a  power  stronger  than 
his  own. 

27.  So  nOw  we  have  the  second  example  of  the  strong  man 
in  his  !house  and  of  the  yet  stronger  hero  who  binds  him  and 
pillages  the  house.  The  comparison  is  put  somewhat  more  fully 
and  exp'licitly  (B.  Weiss  thinks,  more  originally)  in  Luke.  But 
it  has  possibly  been,  as  Loisy  thinks,  made  more  allegorical  tJhati 
it  was  originally.  Fot  to  the  Evangelist  the  strong  man  is  Satan 
himself;  his  'goodis'  are  perhaps  the  demons,  and  the  stronger 
man  who  binds  him  and  pillages  the  house  is  Jesus. 

28.  29.  Whether  this  passage  originally  belonged  to  the  fore- 
going seotiofn  may  be  doTsibted.  The  way  in  which  Mark  explains 
the  connection  in  30  is  rather  awkward.    Nevertheless  it  does  not 


III.  20-30]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 17 

by  any  means  form  a  bad  conclusion,  and  can  be  easily  made  to 
have  a  direct  bearing  upon  the  attitude  of  the  Scribes  towards 
the  exorcisms  of  Jesus.  It  is  not  a  question,  as  it  would  seem,  of 
sins  in  general,  but  only  of  blasphemies.  It  is  therefore  possible, 
as  W.  suggests,  that  the  woirds  ra  afiapfijfiaTa  kuI  at  ffKuKn^T^ixiOii 
may  be  a  later  insertion  due  to  the  text  of  Matthew.  In  that 
case  the  rendering  would  be :  '  All  shall  be  forgiven  unto  the  sons 
of  men  whatsoever  they  may  blaspheme ;  but  he,'  &o.  The  unfor- 
givable blasphemy  is  to  deny  the  results  of  the  divine  Spirit  and 
to  ascribe  them  to  Satan.  The  Jews  admit  that  the  works  of 
Jesus  can  only  be  due  to  supernatural  power,  but  this  power  they 
declare  to  be  not  divine,  but  Satanic.  Such  a  view  Jesus  holds 
to  be  not  only  irrational  (for  Satan  would  and  could  not  expel 
Satan),  but  also  blasphemous.  W.  points  out  the  prophets  were 
quite  similarly  indignant  by  a  denial  that  they  were  moved  by 
the  Spirit.  There  seems  no  question  that  this  famous  utterance 
was  also  preserved  in  Q,  and  that  Q's  form  of  it  is  substantially 
found  in  Luke  (xii.  10).  Matthew  gives  a  conflation  of  Q  and 
Mark.  The  only  point  of  difference  among  scholars  is:  which 
form  is  more  original,  or  which  is  nearer  to  the  original,  Q  or 
Mark  ?  Naturally  W.  argues  one  way,  B.  Weiss  the  other.  The 
version  in  Luke  speaks  of  words  uttered  against  the  Son  of  man. 
In  favour  of  the  originality  of  this  version,  it  is  argued :  would 
any  later  writer  have  allowed  that  an  insult  against  the  Son  of 
man,  i.e.  Jesus,  was  pardonable  ?  Is  it  conceivable  that  a  saying 
which  had  not  that  meaning  originally  would  have  been  given 
such  a  twist  or  change  ?  And,  secondly,  are  not  the  odd  words 
'  sons  of  men '  in  Mark  iii.  28  a  relic  of  the  original  '  Son  of  man ' 
in  Luke  xii.  10?  But  the  arguments  on  the  other  side  are  very 
strong.  The  form  in  Luke  xii.  10  would  imply  that  Jesus  here 
spoke  of  himself  as  the  Son  of  man,  the  difficulty  of  which 
assumption  we  have  already  noted.  Again,  he  would  draw  a 
subtle  distinction  between  an  attack  or  insult  against  him  in  his 
merely  human  capacity,  and  an  insult  against  the  divine  Spirit 
within  him,  when  e.g.  he  expels  a  demon.  But  this  is  surely  too 
subtle  and  theological  and  late  a  distinction.  '  Mark's  version  is, 
therefore,  more  probably  original,  though  not  necessarily  in  the 
exact  form  in  which  we  now  have  it.  See  further  the  notes  on 
Matt.  xii.  31  where  W.'s  explanation  of  the  'sons  of  men'  in 
Mark  iii.  28  is  also  given. 

We  disagree  with  Jesus  in  his  teaching  on  this  point,  though 
we  understand  his  sensitiveness.  To  us,  who  have  been  taught 
from  our  childhood  the  infinite  mercy  of  God,  there  can  be  no  sin 
for  which  there  can  be  no  forgiveness.  We  do  not  believe  in 
eternal  punishment. 


Il8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [III.  20-30 

I  wrote  this  note  remembering,  and  deeply  influenced  by,  the 
simple  and  excellent  religious  teaching  of  ray  childhood.  It  was 
a  wise  and  right  thing  to  make  children  recoil  in  horror  before 
the  conception  of  a  loving  God  who  yet  consigns  his  frail  children 
to  everlasting  penalties  and  pains.  Nothing  does  modern  Judaism 
greater  credit  than  its  passionate  antagonism  to  this  pitiless  dogma. 
At  the  same  time  I  see  the  justification  from  another,  perhaps 
more  philosophical,  point  of  view,  of  Dr  Carpenter  when  he  writes 
bidding  me  remember  that :  '  Forgiveness  is  something  much  more 
than  remission  of  a  punishment.  I  doubt  whether  in  the  highest 
morality  punishment  can  be  remitted.  Forgiveness  to  be  complete 
is  the  act  (and  state)  of  more  than  one  person.  It  takes  two: 
(i)  the  person  who  forgives,  who  restores  the  condition  of  moral 
harmony,  sympathy  and  love,  on  his  side ;  and  (2)  the  person  who 
repents  and  re-enters  the  life  of  obedience  and  aflfection.  The 
condition  of  (2)  is  essential  to  the  whole  process.  As  long  as  he 
remains  wilful  and  unloving,  he  cannot  be  forgiven ;  the  injured 
father,  husband,  friend — God  in  the  heavenly  world — may  be  all 
ready  and  longing,  but  they  cannot  forgive  one  who  does  not  want 
to  be  forgiven.  The  person  who  is  in  a  state  of  blaspheming  the 
Holy  Spirit  is  self-excluded  from  forgiveness :  God's  love  does  not 
reach  him.  How  this  condition  is  to  be  changed,  what  energies 
of  grace  may  be  required,  what  start  in  a  new  life  under  fresh 
conditions,  how  many  lives  of  discipline  and  patience  may  be 
needed,  we  cannot  tell.  Ultimately  the  divine  love  will  win; 
but  of  the  process  and  the  time  we  know  nothing.  How  far 
Jesus  realized  what  we  call  "  eternity,"  it  is  impossible  to  decide ; 
but  I  do  not  think  that  this  passage,  truly  understood,  imphes 
eternal  punishment,  as  against  the  infinite  mercy  of  God.  The 
ultimate  punishment  is  Ezekiel's  remembrance  and  loathing, 
which  we  shall  not  desire  to  abridge,  knowing  its  purifying  power.' 
But  the  enormous  difference  between  the  views  here  put  forth 
and  the  ordinary  view  of  Rabbinic  Judaism  (shared  in  all  proba- 
bility by  Jesus)  is  this:  According  to  the  old  view  there  was 
rarely,  if  ever,  any  effective  repentance  after  death,  even  if  the 
sinner  wished  it.  Thus  punishment  was  merely  penal  or  retribu- 
tive, not  purifying. 

31-35.    Jesus  and  his  Family 
(Cp.  Matt.  xii.  46-50;  Luke  viii.  19-21) 

31  And  his  mother  and  his  brothers  came,  and,  standing  outside, 

32  sent  unto  him  to  call  him.     And  a  crowd  was  sitting  round  him, 
and  they  said  unto  him,  'Behold,  thy  mother  and  thy  brothers  are 


III.  31-35]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 19 

33  outside  and  seek  thee.'     And  he  answered  them,  saying, '  Who  is 

34  my  mother,  or  my  brothers?'    And  he  looked  at  those  who  sat 

35  around  him,  and  said, '  Behold  my  mother  and  my  brothers.  For 
whoever  doeth  the  will  of  God,  he  is  to  me  brother,  and  sister,  and 
mother.' 

The  narrative  begun  in  verse  21  is  now  resumed.  This  story 
could  only  have  taken  place  early  in  the  career  of  Jesus.  The 
action  of  his  family  depends  upon  their  opinion  that  he  is 
'possessed'  (21).  This  also  explains,  and  perhaps  justifies,  his 
sarcastic  reply.  They  send  to  fetch  him  away  and  take  him 
home. 

J.  Weiss  has  an  excellent  note  upon  the  harsh  bearing  of 
Jesus  towards  his  mother  and  family.  He  points  out  that  it  is 
explicable  (and  perhaps  justifiable)  on  the  grounds  (a)  that  his 
family  did  not  understand  or  believe  in  his  mission,  (6)  that  his 
'  whole  soul  was  so  filled  with  this  mission  that  there  was  no  room 
in  it  for  family  ties  and  interests,  and  (c)  (the  most  important  of 
all)  that  his  special  work  implied  and  demanded  a  separation 
from,  an  abandonment  of,  all  worldly  connections  and  occupations. 
A  placid  devotion  to  the  peaceful  atmosphere  of  family  life  could 
not  easily  be  united  with  his  passionate  yearning  for  the  Kangdom 
of  God.  Yet  for  all  that  there  is  a  certain  violation  ox  froissement 
of  Jewish  sentiment  as  to  parents  in  this  passage.  It  will  be 
further  alluded  to  later  on. 

32.  The  omission  of  his  father  must  not  be  attributed  to  the 
fact  that  Mark  knew  the  story  of  the  virgin  birth.  Perhaps  the 
father  was  already  dead.  At  any  rate,  if  the  mother  had  known 
that  her  child  had  been  miraculously  bom,  and  that  he  was  the 
'Messiah  of  God,'  she  would  hardly  have  acted  as  she  is  here 
represented.  Some  MSS.  add  '  and  thy  sisters.'  But  the  sisters 
have  probably  been  deduced  from  verse  35  and  vi.  3.  In  34 
Jesus  only  speaks  of  mother  and  brothers.  In  35  he  mentions 
the  sisters,  because  'pr^sentes  ou  non,  ses  soeurs  sembleraient 
devoir  lui  ^tre  aussi  proches  que  ses  frferes'  {E.  S.  i.  p.  722,  n.  3). 
Matthew  rightly  interprets  'those  sitting  around  him'  to  mean 
his  disciples,  or  more  particularly,  the  Twelve. 

35.    'The  will  of  God,'  i.e.  generally.     'The  righteous  man  is 
^     my  brother.'     Cp.  Matt.  vii.  21. 


I20  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  1-20 

CHAPTER  rV 

1-20.    The  Parable  of  the  Sower 
{Gp.  Matt.  xiii.  1-23;  Luke  viii.  4-15) 

1  And  he  began  again  to  teach  by  the  lake  side  :  and  there  was 
gathered  unto  him  a  great  crowd,  so  that  he  entered  into  a  boat, 
and  sat  therein  on  the  lake;  and  the  whole  crowd  was  by  the  lake 

2  on  the  land.     And  he  taught  them  many  things  in  parables,  and 

3  said  unto  them  in  his  teaching :  '  Hearken :  behold,  there  went 

4  out  a  sower  to  sow.  And  it  came  to  pass,  as  he  sowed,  some  seed 
fell  on  the  way  side,  and  the  birds  of  the  air  came  and  devoured 

5  it  up.  And  some  fell  on  stony  ground,  where  it  had  not  much 
earth:  and  it  sprang  up  quickly,  because  it  had  no  depth  of  earth. 

6  But  when  the  sun  rose  up,  it  was  scorched ;  and  because  it  had 

7  no  root,  it  withered  away.     And  some  fell  among  thorns,  and  the 

8  thorns  grew  up,  and  choked  it,  and  it  bore  no  crop.  But  some 
seed  fell  on  good  ground,  and  bore  a  crop  which  sprang  up  and 
increased,  and  yielded  thirty,  and  sixty,  and  even  an  hundred 

9  fold.'  And  he  said  unto  them,  '  He  that  hath  ears  to  hear,  let 
him  hear.' 

10  And  when  he  was  alone,  they  that  were  about  him,  together 

11  with  the  Twelve,  asked  him  concerning  the  parables.  And  he 
said  unto  them, '  Unto  you  is  given  the  mystery  of  the  kingdom 
of  God :  but  unto  them  that  are  without,  all  is  said  in  parables ; 

12  in  order  that  seeing  they  may  see,  and  not  perceive ;  and  hearing 
they  may  hear,  and  not  understand ;  lest  they  should  return,  and 
be  forgiven.' 

13  And  he  said  unto  them,  'Ye  understand  not  this  parable  ?  how 
then  will  ye  understand  all  the  other  parables  ? 

14, 15  '  The  sower  soweth  the  Word.  And  these  are  they  by  the  way 
side:  there  the  Word  is  sown,  and  when  they  have  heard  it,  Satan 
Cometh  immediately,  and  taketh  away  the  Word  which  was  sown 

16  in  them.  And  these  are  they  who  are,  as  it  were,  sown  on  stony 
ground,  who,  when  they  have  heaM  the  Word,  immediately  receive 

17  it  with  gladness:  but  they  have  no  root  in  themselves,  and  so 


IV.  1-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  I2i 

endure  but  far  a  time:  afterward,  when  affliction  or  persecution 

i8  ariseth  for  the  Word's  sake,  immediately  they  fall  away.     And 

these  are  they  who  are  sown  among  thorns ;  these  hear  the  Word, 

19  hut  the  cares  of  the  world,  and  the  deceitfulness  of  riches,  and 
the  other  desires  enter  in,  and  choke  the  Word,  and  it  remaineth 

20  unfruitful.  And  these  are  they  who  are  sown  on  good  ground ; 
who  hear  the  Word  and  receive  it,  and  bear  a  crop,  thirty,  and 
sixty,  and  even  an  hundred  fold.' 

A  fresh  section  containing  parables  extends  from^  iv.  i  to 
iv.   34-       .  . 

The  original  narrative  seems  interrupted  after  9.  The  section 
10^20  is  probably  secondary,  and  in  it  verses  1 1  and  1 2  form  a 
further  interpolation.  It  may  also  be  argued  that  21-25  would 
not  have  been  put  where  they  are  if  26-29  had  originally  followed 
20.  The  addition  of  the  extraneous  sayings  in  21-25  c^''^  ^^^y  ^^ 
understood  if  the  main  theme  is  finished  and  is  not  subsequently 
resumed.  The  second  parable  (26-29)  appears  in  fact  as  a  mere 
variant  of  the  first;  the  third  (30-32)  betrays  its  later  date  by  its 
peculiar  conception  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  which  is  of  a  kind  that 
appears  nowhere  else  in  Mark,  and  which  prepares  the  way  for 
Matthew.     So  argues  W.  (Einleitung,  p.  55). 

W.  has  also  some  good  remarks  upon  the  parables  generally : 

'  That  Jesus  liked  to  speak  in  parables  was  already  shown  in 
iii.  23.  Between  metaphor,  proverb,  parable,  and  allegory  the 
Semitic  term  mashal,  niathla,  makes  no  difiference....A  mere 
saying  is  called  irapa^oXri,  'parable,'  in  vii.  17.  Thus  we  may  not 
set  up  sharply  defined  categories,  as  if  we  were  dealing  with  Greek 
rhetoric.  It  is  true  that  the  Semitic  parables  often  touch  on  a 
single  point,  which  is  set  in  high  relief,  while  everything  else 
remains  outside  the  comparison  and  in  darkness.  But  often  the 
parable  applies  to  many  points,  and  it  then  corresponds  with  or 
comes  near  to  allegory.  One  must  not  exclude  allegory  too 
trenchantly.  Not  all  the  parables  must  be  interpreted  by  a  single 
principle;  one  must  consider  each  case  separately.'  (See  also 
Additional  Note  14.) 

Whence  did  Mark  obtain  his  parables  ?  If  it  was,  as  Loisy 
and  others  think,  from  Q,  and  if  all  Matthew's  parables  came  also 
from  that  source,  how  can  we  adequately  account  for  the  fact 
that  the  point  of  view  of  several  of  Matthew's  parables  seems 
undoubtedly  later  than  those  of  Mark,  and  to  reflect  a  fairly 
advanced  stage  of  Christian  development  ?  Are  we  here  too  to 
press  Jiilicher's  explanation — that  Q  was  constantly  growing  so 
that  the  Q  which  Mark  knew  and  used  was  a  much  smaller  and 


122  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  1-20 

earlier  Q  than  the  Q  from  whom  Matthew  and  Luke  drew  bo 
much  of  their  material  ?  One  has  the  feeling  as  if  this  explanation 
must  not  be  ridden  too  hard.  Of  our  section  in  Mark  Loisy  says : 
'The  discourse  containing  the  parables  (1-34)  is  an  artificial 
composition  which  in  its  present  form  is  intended  to  explain  the 
rejection  of  the  Jews,  but  of  which  the  redaction  has  passed 
through  more  than  one  stage.  As  the  saying  about  retribution, 
the  comparison  of  the  lamp,  the  parable  of  the  mustard  seed, 
certainly  existed  in  the  '  recueil  de  discours '  (Q)  which  Matthew 
and  Luke  used,  we  may  believe  (il  est  k  croire)  that  they  were 
taken  thence  by  Mark  and  that  the  parables  of  the  sower  and  of 
the  seed  (26-29)  have  the  same  origin '  (E.  S.  L  p.  89).  B.  Weiss 
thinks  that  Luke's  form  of  the  parable  of  the  sower  is  more 
original  (nearer  to  Q)  than  Mark's,  but  Loisy,  on  the  contrary, 
thinks  that  both  Luke  and  Matthew  are  here  only  dependent 
upon  Mark 

2.  '  In  parables,'  i.e.  in  a  parabolic  way ;  iv  ry  BiSa^^,  '  in  the 
course  of  his  teaching.' 

3.  'The  parable  of  the  sower  comes  first,  not  only  because 
tradition  associates  with  it  an  explanation  of  the  general  aim  of  the 
parables,  but  because  it  is  the  parable  of  the  Word,  and  because  it 
had  of  itself  an  almost  universal  character  which  marked  it  out  as 
the  typical  parable.  It  must  have  occupied  the  first  place  in  the 
oldest  collection  of  parables,  even  before  speculation  on  the 
mysteries  of  teaching  by  parables  and  on  the  special  reasons  why 
Jesus  chose  that  method  of  teaching  had  begun '  (E,  S.  L  p.  730). 

4.  irapa  ri)v  oSov,  'along  the  path.' 

7.  The  thorns  fulfil  the  same  office  as  weeds  (cp.  Matt.  viL  25). 
W.  points  out  that  in  the  Old  Testament  there  is  no  word  for 
'  weeds,'  but  that '  thorn  and  thistle '  represent  them. 

10-20.  The  explanation  of  the  parable.  A  '  secondary '  sec- 
tion. 

10.  'His  companions  as  well  as  the  Twelve.'  Were  they  all 
in  the  boat  ?  Or  has  Jesus  landed  ?  But  in  35  he  is  still  in  the 
boat.  The  Twelve  had  not,  so  far,  been  specially  mentioned. 
The  plural  '  parables '  is  odd.  Only  one  had  been,  so  far,  spoken. 
In  fact  at  this  point  there  is  intercalated  a  general  statement 
embodying  a  theory  about  the  parables  as  a  whole.  We  may 
suppose  that  an  original  singular  has  been,  on  account  of  the 
interpolation  of  11  and  12,  changed  into  the  plural. 


IV.  I-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  123 

II,  12.  'The  mystery  of  the  Kingdom,'  i.e.  you  are  permitted 
to  understand  its  laws  and  constitution,  the  conditions  of  entering 
it,  a.nd  so  on. 

But  it  may  be  doubted  whether  this  explanation  of  the  phrase 
is  adequate.  For  the  word 'mystery' is  not  lightly  used.  Is  Wrede 
more  right  than  wrong  in  holding  that  the  mystery  of  the  King- 
dom refers  to  Jesus's  own  position  in  the  Kingdom  as  well  as  to 
the  Kingdom  itself?  His  Messiahship  is  the  mystery  which  is  to 
be  revealed  to  the  disciples — in  spite  of  their  obtuseness — but 
hidden  from  the  world  at  large  till  death  and  resurrection  reveal 
it.  Jesus  himself,  therefore,  we  may  safely  assume,  did  not  speak 
these  words.  Moreover,  private  teaching  when  the  disciples  are 
alone  with  Jesus  seems  to  be  an  indication  of  secondary  portions 
of  Mark.  The  word  'mystery'  is  only  here  found  in  the  Synoptics. 
An  esoteric  teaching  was  wholly  alien  to  the  historic  Jesus :  he 
did  not  regard  and  present  the  Kingdom  as  a  mystery  (Loisy, 
E.  S.  I.  p.  741).  He  pities  the  multitude,  and  would  not  wish  to 
darken,  but  to  enlighten  them.  Moreover,  iv.  21  contradicts  these 
two  verses,  and  the  parable  itself  contradicts  them.  For  all 
understand  the  Word,  but  not  all  take  it  to  heart.  Jesus  may 
have  used  parables  to  make  people  think,  and  even  to  test  intel- 
ligence, but  surely  not  to  keep  his  meaning  dark  except  to  a  few 
special  disciples.  Menzies  rightly  says  that  it  is  impossible  to 
believe  that  Jesus  said  or  thought  what  is  in  these  verses.  They 
suggest  Romans  xi.  7,  8,  and  later  reflection  and  experience. 

Professor  Burkitt,  in  his  intense  desire  to  establish  the  his- 
torical character  of  Mark,  even  seeks  to  save  these  verses.  They 
are  'appropriate  to  the  situation.'  Jesus  after  the  scene  in  the 
synagogue  has  come  to  a  'definite  breach'  with  the  Jewish 
authority.  His  new  Kingdom  can  only  be  inaugurated  by  '  a  long 
period  of  gradual  growth,  the  long  and  intimate  intercourse'  of 
Jesus  with  his  disciples.  (But  this  long  period  is,  at  the  most,  a 
year.)  '  If  Jesus  is  now  outside  the  old  synagogue,  the  people  of 
the  synagogue  are  equally  outside  the  new  Church.'  Hence  the 
propriety  of  verse  ii,  'To  his  disciples  he  will  give  further  ex- 
planations, but  if  those  outside  misunderstand  his  teaching,  he  has 
other  work  than  to  go  out  of  his  way  to  answer  their  cavils '  (op. 
dt.  pp.  86-88).  This  explanation  would  imply  that  the  'you'  means 
not  only  all  disciples,  but  all  would-be  disciples  too,  for  Professor 
Burkitt  himself  admits  that  it  was  only  the  '  hostile '  whom  Jesus 
meant  to  exclude,  not  those  who  came  and  asked  him  in  a  friendly 
spirit,  even  in  the  case  of  'outsiders.'  But  the  words,  naturally 
interpreted,  do  not  bear  this  sense.  They  certainly  suggest  the 
explanation  given  above,  and  seem  later  than,  and  unworthy  of, 
Jesus.     The  parable  itself  implies  that  the  seed  bears  fruit  and 


124  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  1-30 

that  the  "Word  has  bad  some  good  success  atnoog  those  who  heard 
it.  The  conception  of  11  and  12  is  Pauline.  The  expression 
oi  e^to, '  they  who  are  without,'  is  semi-technical.  It  is  useid  in  the 
Preface  to  Sirach  of  those  who  are  ignorant  of  the  Law.  The 
corresponding  Hebrew  term  was  used  also  of  the  heathen.  Cp.  its 
use  in  i  Cor.  v.  1 2,  1 3^  Jesus  would  hardly  have  made  or  admitted 
this  wall  of  severance  between  tkoae  within  and  those  without. 

13-29.  After  the  interruption  of  1 1  and  12  a  fresh  start  Is  made. 
The  explanation  of  the  parable  of  the  sower  is  now  given.  The 
section  seems  later  than  the  parable  and,  probably,  not  authentic, 
but  earlier  than  1 1  and  1 2.  Jesus  is  in  the  boat.  But  he  is 
supposed  to  give  the  explanation  to  the  disciples  alone,  when  they 
are  by  themselves.  Yet  in  26  he  speaks  another  parable  under 
the  same  circumstances  as  1-9,  namely  in  the  boat.  The  expla- 
nation is,  as  Loisy  says,  a  sort  of  '  enclave '  stuck  into  the  middle 
of  the  parables.  The  enclave  is  itself  not  homogeneous.  Hence 
the  muddle  that  the  disciples  ask  for  the  meaning  of  the  parables 
in  the  plural;  the  single  question  was  to  serve  for  the  answer 
in  II,  12,  and  in  1 3-20.  The  reason  of  the  question  is  to  be 
sought,  first  in  that  the  parables  really  became  less  clear  to  a 
later  age,  secondly  in  that  an  explanation  was  sought  for  the  feet 
that  the  Jews  had  rejected  the  teaching  of  Jesus.  This  rejection 
or  blindness  was  declared  to  be  providential ;  and  therefore  the 
parables  were  intended  not  to  enlighten  them,  but  to  deepen  their 
darkness.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  explanation  mixes  up  the 
'  allegorical '  details  with  the  things  which  they  '  allegorise.'  The 
Word  is  the  seed,  not  the  men ;  yet  the  different  kinds  of  crop  axe 
represented  by  men.  The  hearers  should  really  have  been  identified 
with  the  soil,  not  with  the  seed.  In  the  original  story  the  details 
may  not  have  been  intended  to  have  the  precise  meaning  now 
assigned  to  them.  In  other  words,  it  was  a  pardble,  rabher  than 
an  allegory. 

14.  The  Word  is  the  special  'Word'  concerning  the  Kingdom. 

15.  Wellhausen  places  a  colon  at  6S6v.  Ot  Trapa  rrjv  oSov  is 
to  be  explained,  and  the  explanation  begins  with  ottov.  The 
ground  on  which  the  seed  falls  represents  the  men  who  hear  the 
Word.  Loisy  would,  however,  render :  '  And  they  by  the  way  side 
where  the  Word  is  sown  are  they  to  whom,  when  they  hear,  Satan 
comes  straightway  and  takes  away  the  Word  which  has  been  sown 
in  them.' 

Satan  is  here  the  general  cause  of  evil  issues.  He  is  no  special 
evil,  like  the  cares  of  the  world,  and  therefore  is  not  typified  by 


IV.  1-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  12$ 

the  birds  in  the  same  way  as  the  thorns  typify  the  cares.  The 
introduction  of  Satan  is,  however,  on  the  way  to  the  view  taken 
in  II  and  12,  and  another  step  is  taken  in  Luke  viii.  12,  'that 
they  may  not  believe  and  be  saved.'  Satan  comes  to  those  who 
are  predestined  to  an  evil  end. 

17.  TrpoaKatpol,  'endure  for  a  while.'  W.,  ' wetterwendisch.' 
The  era  of  persecution  has  already  begun.  On  the  first  per- 
secutions of  the  Christians  by  the  Jews,  see  Additional  Note  15. 

The  main  purpose  of  the  parable  is  to  explain  'pourquoi 
rEvangile  ne  compte  pas  plus  d'adherents,  pourquoi  surtout  il  ne 
retient  pas  tout  ceux  qui  ont  paru  I'accueillir.'  Mark  and  Matthew 
want  to  explain  why  the  apparent  gains  of  the  gospel  have  sufiFered 
loss ;  Luke  also  adds  the  thought  of  showing  in  relief  the  faithful 
endurance  of  those  who  remain  constant.  Thus  the  Christian 
community  is  already  constituted ;  the  Christian  religion  is  a 
faith  '  qui  est  combattue  au  dehors,  et  qui  exige,  avant  la  recom- 
pense, une  longue  pratique  du  desi-nteressetuent  et  de  la  mortifica- 
tion' {E.  8.  I.  p.  757). 

W.  calls  the  explanation  of  the  parable  'correct  and  beautiful.' 
Whether  he  regards  it,  though  inserted  later  into  Mark,  as  never- 
theless authentic  in  substance,  is  not  quite  clear  to  me.  As  to 
the  parable  itself  he  says  : 

'  Jesus  is  not  so  much  teaching  here  as  reflecting  aloud  upon 
the  results  of  his  teaching,  which  results  do  not  differ  from  those 
of  true  teaching  in  general.  "  I  scatter  the  seed ;  I  know  not 
whither  it  may  fall.  Mostly,  for  sure,  upon  unfruitful  soil. 
Nevertheless  I  must  sow  it ;  in  some  hearts  at  least  it  will  bear 
its  fruit."  The  old  prophets  felt  the  same.  Isaiah  (quoted  here 
in  iv.  II,  12)  not  only  preached  to  deaf  ears,  but  his  very  preaching 
makes  them  deaf:  so  is  it  decreed;  yet  he  has  to  preach,  all  else 
is  God's  affair.  But  the  resignation  of  Jesus  does  not  amount  to 
the  despair  of  Elijah  and  Jeremiah.  This  difference  is  not  only 
due  to  his  higher  laith  in  God,  but  also  that,  unlike  them,  he  had 
a  great  visible  result.  Moreover,  just  as  Isaiah  vi.  does  not  really 
belong  to  the  beginning  of  Isaiah's  ministry,  so  Jesus  in  Mark  iv 
has  already  had  experiences  which  keep  him  from  any  self- 
deception  as  to  the  Value  of  the  applause  which  the  people  render 
him.'  Menzies  says :  '  The  parable  gives  us  under  a  thin  disguise 
the  experiences  of  Jesus  as  a  preacher.'  He  has  had  some 
failures,  but  in  spite  of  these  be  look«  for,  and  is  sure  of,  success 
in  the  end.  The  parable  could  not  have  been  spoken  very  early 
in  the  ministry. 

M.  Loisy  also  urges  that  the  parable  is  merely  meant  to  explain 
the  diverse,  actual  results  of  Jesus's  preaching.    '  il  ne  s'agit  pas 


126  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  1-20 

d'autre  chose,  et  Ton  n'a  pas  k  chercher  dans  le  Semeur  la  penst^e 
essentielle  de  J^sus  touchant  sa  propre  mission '  (E.  8.  i.  p.  759). 

What  strikes  one  also  in  the  parable  of  the  sower  is  that  Jesus 
does  not  seem  to  speak  and  think  as  if  the  old  order,  the  natural 
world,  were  soon  coming  to  a  violent  end.  He  speaks  rather  as  if 
there  were  to  be  a  long  process  in  which  righteousness  should,  as 
it  were,  gradually  come  by  its  own.  The  Kingdom  of  God  upon 
earth,  the  reign  of  goodness  and  truth,  will  surely  come,  but  only 
gradually.  His  own  person  is  not  the  centre  of  all  things.  The 
drama  does  not  consist  of  his  life,  his  death,  his  resurrection,  and 
the  Last  Judgment — all  closely  following  each  other — but  it  consists 
in  the  gradual  reception  of  his  teaching  by  a  dull  and  reluctant 
world.  This  second,  truer,  and  more  modern  conception  may 
have  existed  in  his  mind  as  well  as  the  more  eschatological  and 
apocalyptic  conception.  And  perhaps  he  did  not  perceive  their 
inconsistency. 


21-25.    The  Hidden  and  the  Revealed — 
Measure  for  Measure 

(Gp.  Matt.  V.  15,  X.  26,  vii.  2,  xiii.  12,  xxv.  29;  Luke  viii.  16-18, 
vi.  38,  xi.  33,  xii.  2,  xix.  26) 

21  And  he  said  unto  them,  'Is  the  lamp  brought  in  to  be  put 
under  the  bushel,  or  under  the  bed  ?  and  not  rather  to  be  placed 

22  on  the  stand?  For  there  is  nothing  hid,  which  shall  not  be 
revealed ;  neither  was  any  thing  kept  secret,  but  that  it  should 

23  come  to  light.     Who  hath  ears  to  hear,  let  him  hear.' 

24  And  he  said  unto  them,  '  Take  heed  what  ye  hear :  with  what 
measure  ye  mete,  it  shall  be  measured  to  you,  and  even  more 

25  shall  be  added  thereto.  For  he  that  hath,  to  him  shall  be  given : 
and  he  that  hath  not,  from  him  shall  be  taken  even  that  which 
he  hath.' 

A  collection  of  somewhat  disconnected  sentences,  but  for  that 
very  reason  not  unlikely  to  be  original,  i.e.  to  spring  from  the 
mouth  of  Jesus  himself. 

21  occurs  in  Matt.  v.  15,  with  a  different  meaning.  The 
light  in  Mark  is  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  and  this  is  doubtless 
original. 

22,  which  joins  on  fairly  well  to  21,  also  contradicts  1 1  and  12. 
At  any  rate,  it  declares  that  any  esoteric  doctrine  is  only  to  be 


IV.  21-25]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  127 

temporary.  What  for  a  time  may  have  been  reserved  for  a  few  is 
iiltimately  to  be  given  to  the  world.  The  mystery  of  the  hidden 
Messiahship,  the  reserve  of  Jesus  in  his  hfetime,  are  not  to  be 
followed  by  the  disciples.  So  Mark  may  have  understood  the 
saying.  In  Matthew  the  saying  occurs  x.  26.  Dr  Carpenter 
thinks  that,  as  spoken  by  Jesus,  both  21  and  22  'obviously  refer 
to  the  propagation  of  "the  Word,"  which  is  not  to  be  hidden 
away  privately,  but  brought  forth  for  the  common  good.'  Or  the 
two  verses  may  mean  that  the  consummation  of  the  Word  will  be 
the  Kingdom,  and  that  the  Kingdom  will  be  ultimately  public 
and  visible  (E.  8.  I.  p.  761).  Whether  Mark  found  these  verses 
in  Q  is  disputed. 

24.  The  first  part  of  this  verse  seems  merely  to  mean  '  Pay 
attention'  (cp.  the  beginning  of  iv.  3  and  end  of  vii.  14).  Hear 
rightly  and  with  good  understanding.  Luke  has  '  take  heed  how 
ye  hear,'  i.e.  hear  with  intelligence.  The  subsequent  adage  is 
not  connected  with  the  first  part  of  the  verse  or  with  what  has 
preceded,  and  W.  thinks  that  its  place  may  be  merely  due  to 
the  outward  resemblance  of  the  word  '  hear,'   occurring  in  both 

,  23  and  24.  The  adage  is  found  also  in  Matt.  vii.  2  and 
Luke  vi.  38.  As  to  the  meaning  of  the  verse  one  can  ask : 
(a)  what  did  Jesus  mean  by  it  ?  (b)  what  did  it  mean  to  the 
compiler  of  the  source  whence  Mark  took  it,  assuming  that  he  did 
so  ?  (c)  what  did  it  mean  to  Mark  ?  As  regards  the  third,  some 
suppose  that  it  relates  to  the  measure  of  attentiveness  which  the 
disciples  pay.  According  to  your  attentiveness  will  be  the  measure 
of  your  gain.  But  if  you  attend  well,  you  will  find  in  the  words  of 
Jesus  more  than  you  could  have  suspected.  Or,  again,  it  may  mean : 
if  you  act  according  to  the  teaching,  you  will  be  abundantly  re- 
warded. The  original  meaning  may  be  the  same  as  the  parallel 
in  Matt.  vii.  2  :  God  will  show  to  man  the  same  measure  which  he 
shows  to  his  neighbour.  Jesus  attacks  the  doctriae  of  tit  for  tat 
in  some  of  its  forms,  but  in  others  he  maintains  and  retains  it. 

25.  Though  this  verse  is  supposed  to  prove  24;  it  is  more 
probably  independent  of  it.  The  saying  also  occurs  in  Matt. 
xiii.  1 2,  XXV.  9 ;  Luke  xix.  26.  Loisy  thinks  that  Mark  took  the 
sentence  from  the  parable  of  the  talents.  But  against  this  view, 
W.'s  argument  seems  strong.  Whether,  he  says,  the  saying  has  its 
true  origin  in  that  parable  may  well  be  doubted.  '  Why  should 
Mark  have  thought  of  detaching  it  from  the  context  and  making 
it  unintelligible?  Generally  speaking,  a  number  of  detached 
sayings,  loosely  strung  together  on  a  thread  of  a  purely  external 
connection,  raises  the  presumption  of  originality.  Not  that  the 
■discourses  of  Jesus  were  nothing  but  a  series  of  apophthegms,  but 


128  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  21-25 

that  in  many  cases  only  striking  details  of  his  speeches  were  re- 
membered, and  these  were  subsequently  used  as  stones  for  a  new 
structure. 

No  doubt  in  Holtzraann  and  elsewhere  one  can  read  attempts 
to  connect  21-25  together,  and  to  relate  them  all  to  the  special 
knowledge  ascribed  and  granted  to  the  disciples  in  iv.  10.  But  it 
cannot  be  said  that  the  attempts  are  very  successful  or  result  in 
very  natural  explanations. 

If  W.  is  right  in  his  view  that  'for'  attempts  a  connection 
where  none  originally  existed,  the  twenty-fifth  verse  must  be 
considered  and  explained  by  itself. 

The  adage  seems  profoundly  and  sternly  true.  He  who  does 
not  advance  falls  back.  He  whose  knowledge  or  goodness  is  alive 
and  real  necessarily  improves  in  knowledge  and  goodness;  he 
whose  knowledge  or  goodness  is  conventional  and  sterile  has  no 
real  grip  upon  either  knowledge  or  goodness ;  his  possessions  are 
no  real  possessions,  and  what  he  falsely  has  he  will  actually  lose. 

B.  Weiss  and  Holtzmann  suppose  that  Mark  means  by  the 
saying.  If  you  attend  to  the  teaching, — to  what  you  hear, — your 
knowledge  will  increase  and  increase ;  if  you  do  not  attend,  you 
will  soon  even  forget  what  you  have  heard  (Quellen,  A,  p.  143). 

There  are  interesting  Rabbinic  parallels  quoted  by  Wiinsche, 
Neue  Beitrage. 

The  above  argument  of  W.'s  seemed  and  still  seems  to  me 
of  cogency.  It  has,  however,  been  directly  met  by  Bousset 
{Theologische  Rwndschau,  1906,  p.  14)  in  the  following  way:  21-25 
is,  he  thinks,  a  very  artificial  composition  with  a  clearly  recognizable 
tendency.  Mark  wants  to  ma,ke  Jesus  express  his  astonishment 
and  pain  at  the  blindness  and  obduracy  of  the  people,  but  also  Ms 
confidence  that  his  words  will  not  always  be  misunderstood  or 
hidden,  and  his  exhortation  to  the  disciples  that  they  at  least  are 
to  '  hear '  in  the  right  way.  He  does  this  by  picking  out  words 
of  Jesus  and  stringing  them  artificially  togeither.  If  we  compare 
Mark  with  the  parallels  in  Matthew  and  Luke,  it  has  to  be  con- 
fessed about  21  (the  lamp  and  the  bushel)  that  its  original 
meaning  and  reference  are  lost.  Matt.  v.  1 5  is  certainly  secondary, 
and  the  connection  in  Luke  xi.  33  seq.  is  doubtful.  But  Mark 
iv.  22  has  a  more  original  place  in  Matt.  x.  26,  Luke  xii.  2;  24  in 
Matt.  vii.  2,  Luke  vi.  38 ;  and  25  in  Matt.  xxv.  29,  Luke  xix.  26. 
Mark  tore  the  verses  out  of  their  origiaal  setting  because  he 
wanted  them  for  his  own  purposes.  Arid  Bousset  adds :  If  the 
words  of  Jesus  were  first  of  all  reproduced  in  the  arbitrary  con- 
fusion of  Mark  iv.  21-25,  it  is  very  hard  to  see  how  such  a  large 
and  well  arranged  tradition  of  his  words  as  we  find  in  Q  could 
have  come  into  being.     Who  is  right — W.  or  Bousset  ? 


IV.  26-29]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  129 

26-29.    The  Seed  that  grows  of  itself 
(Mark  only) 

26  And  he  said, '  The  kingdom  of  God  is  as  if  a  man  should  cast 

27  seed  into  the  ground ;  and  he  sleepeth  and  ariseth,  night  and  day, 
and  the  seed  sprouteth  and  groweth  up,  he  knoweth  not  how. 

28  For  of  herself  the  earth  bringeth  forth  her  crop ;  first  the  blade, 

29  then  the  ear,  after  that  the  full  corn  in  the  ear.  But  when  the 
crop  is  ready,  immediately  he  sendeth  forth  the  sickle,  because  the 
harvest  hath  come.' 

The  situation  is  the  same  as  iv.  i.  We  now  get  a  fresh 
version,  as  it  were,  of  the  parable  of  the  sower. 

Another  way  of  looking  at  the  matter  would  be  to  hold  that 
the  interpolated  section  includes  21-25  *s  well  as  10-20,  and  that 
with  26  a  fresh  specimen  of  Jesus's  teaching  in  parables  is  given. 
Jesus  may  have  used  the  image  of  a  sower  in  more  than  one 
way,  and  Mark  or  his  source  may  have  grouped  1-9  and  26-29 
together.  For  the  other  view,  see  the  quotation  from  W.  at  the 
beginning  of  the  chapter.  The  Kingdom  of  God  is  compared  to  a 
process.  The  seed  is  sown;  though  some  of  it  is  wasted,  some 
is  successful.  But  it  needs  time ;  yet,  once  sown,  the  good  seed  is 
bound  to  ripen  and  bear  its  fruit.  Jesus  preached  the  Word ;  the 
perfect  Kingdom  of  God  will  appear  in  its  season. 

Jesus  can  only  do  the  part  given  to  him  by  God.  He  must 
not  attempt  to  bring  about  the  Kingdom  of  God  by  violence  or 
storm  (cp.  Matt.  xi.  12).  Nor  is  it  for  him  to  tell  when  precisely 
the  Judgment  and  the  Kingdom  will  come.  Directly  the  seed 
he  has  sown  has  ripened,  God  will  begin  his  harvest.  The  quo- 
tation from  Joel  iv.  13  in  29  shows  that  the  Judgment  is  alluded  to. 

26.  If  Jesus  spoke  this  parable  and  the  parable  of  the  sower, 
can  he  also  have  believed  that  the  end  would  come  so  quickly, 
that  the  new  era  had  in  fact  begun  ?  For  in  the  new  era  there 
is  no  actual  development.  On  first  thoughts  it  might  rather 
seem  as  if  the  parables  sprang  from  those  who  saw  the  young 
Christian  community  before  them,  and  believed  that  a  long  and 
glorious  future  lay  in  front  of  it.  But  against  this  view  there 
is  the  diflSculty  that,  as  Dr  Carpenter  says,  the  early  Christians 
were  all  convinced  that  the  end  was  at  hand.  Perhaps,  then,  Jesus 
had  both  ideas  in  his  mind  and  gave  expression  to  them  upon 
different  occasions,  as  I  have  suggested  in  iv.  17.  Dr  Carpenter 
says :  '  I  agree ;  and  in  this  respect  there  was,  I  think,  a  change, 


130  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  26-29 

not  for  the  better  (from  our  point  of  view).  Jesus  became  more 
eager,  not  for  his  own  personal  triumph,  but  for  God's,  and  so  he 
became  more  apocalyptic' 

29.  Srav  -rrapaBol  6  Kapiro^,  '  when  the  fruit  permits,'  i.e.  is 
ripe.  In  this  verse  some  would  argue  that  another  idea  seems 
to  peep  out.  '  Der  Schluss,'  W.  says,  '  schiesst  liber.  Durch  den 
Bauer  guckt  der  Weltrichter  hervor,  der  hier  nichts  zu  tun  hat.' 
Merx,  following  S.S.,  would  omit  the  '  straightway '  (etJ^v?),  where- 
by, as  he  thinks,  the  apocalyptic  haste  and  suddenness  are  removed. 
Much  hangs  on  a  word.  But  the  sense  which  he  gives  to  the  verse 
is  doubtful.  What  is  meant  by  God  'takes  the  fruit  to  him- 
self when  it  is  ripe '  ?  This  would  bring  into  the  conception  of 
the  growing  Kingdom  a  fresh  idea,  as  if  the  point  of  the  Kingdom 
lay  in  the  gathering  of  individual  souls  to  heaven,  when  they  had 
been  perfected  upon  earth.  Loisy  maintains  that  29  is  an  essential 
part  of  the  parable.  The  harvest  completes  the  story :  it  is  the 
goal  of  the  seed  and  the  sowing.  '  Like  the  husbandman,  Jesus 
sows  the  Kingdom  by  preaching  the  gospel ;  it  does  not  pertain 
to  him  to  produce  the  harvest,  that  is  to  say  the  complete  coming 
of  the  Kingdom,  and  men  ought  not  to  be  impatient  because  this 
coming  is  not  brought  about  at  once ;  that  is  the  business  of  God, 
as  the  actual  and  mysterious  development  of  the  Kingdom  is  his 
work  and  his  secret;  it  is  not  on  that  account  less  certain  that 
the  harvest  will  arrive  without  undue  delay :  for  a  man  sows  only 
to  reap ;  at  the  moment  designed  by  Providence,  the  sower  will 
become  a  reaper.  Miracles  are  not  designedly  excluded,  nor  are 
the  moral  conditions  of  the  coming,  so  far  as  individuals  are  con- 
cerned, the  object  in  view.  The  parousia  is  regarded  as  close  at 
hand,  without  any  consideration  of  the  death  of  Christ  as  an 
intermediate  condition.  Between  the  time  of  the  sowing,  i.e.  the 
preaching  of  the  gospel,  and  the  time  of  the  harvest,  i.e.  the 
glorious  coming  of  the  Messiah,  nothing  is  placed  except  the  work 
of  germination,  the  progress  of  the  Word  and  of  faith  amongst 
men,  which  depends  on  God  alone.  It  may  be  said  that  the 
Kingdom  is  already  on  the  earth  in  the  grain  which  is  sprouting, 
but  it  is  there  only  in  a  state  of  preparation.  The  full  reahty  of 
the  Kingdom  is  the  great  coming '  {E.  8.  i.  p.  765). 

W.  has  some  interesting  remarks  on  the  two  parables,  I-9  and 
26-29.  'In  the  former  parable  differences  in  the  value  of  the 
soil  are  spoken  of:  here  not.  There  the  seed  only  ripens  when  the 
soil  is  good ;  here  it  ripens  always.  There  the  tone  is  resigned, 
because  the  outlook  is  limited  to  the  near  foreground ;  here  the 
tone  is  hopeful,  not  exactly  jubilant,  but  full  of  calm  confidence, 
because  the  vision  is  turned  towards  the  distance  and  contemplates 


IV.  26-29]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  131 

the  whole.  The  sower  can  go  his  way;  he  has  begun  a  process 
which  will  complete  itself  and  reach  its  goal  without  him — in  time. 
Of  course  the  seed  is  here,  too,  the  Word;  that  from  the  Word 
comes  faith,  and  from  the  society  of  the  faithful  the  Kingdom  of 
God,  is  a  result  which  lay  nearer  to  the  community  than  to  Jesus. 
'It  is  noticeable  that  neither  Matthew  nor  Luke  reproduces 
this  section.  It  is  hardly  possible  that  it  was  not  found  in  their 
Mark ;  for  a  late  insertion  it  is  too  original.  Perhaps  they  mistook 
its  originality,  or  thought  it  a  mere  variant  of  2-8 ;  or,  perhaps, 
they  could  not  well  conceive  Jesus  so  apart  and  withdrawn  from 
his  own  creation.. .  .nightly,  though  freely,  Goethe  understood 
the  parable :  Mein  Acker  ist  die  Zeit.' 

It  is  just  this  sentence  of  Goe.the  which  seems  to  me  so  odd 
in  the  mouth  of  Jesus.  W.  is  anxious  for  us  to  believe  that  these 
more  modem  conceptions,  so  removed  from  the  apocalyptic  spirit, 
which  ever  believed  that  the  end  was  imminent,  were  the  thought- 
creations  of  the  historical  Jesus,  or  at  all  events  reproduced  with 
accuracy  his  own  views. 

Another  alternative  is  possible.  It  may  be,  as  Loisy  thinks, 
that  29  is  by  no  means  so  alien  to  the  rest  as  W.  supposes.  It 
may  be  that  Jesus  gave  a  less  extended  meaning  to  the  parable 
than  we  are  inclined  to  do.  Even  in  the  parable  the  full  corn  arises 
and  ripens  quickly ;  so,  perhaps,  did  Jesus  think  it  would  be  with 
the  Kingdom  of  God  upon  earth. 

Menzies  rightly  says  we  must  not '  be  too  sure  that  in  this,  as 
in  other  parables  of  growth,  Jesus  meant  to  indicate  the  view  that 
the  Kingdom  was  to  arrive  gradually  by  development,  rather  than 
suddenly  by  the  act  of  God.  The  prophetic  ministry  was  to  pre- 
pare the  way  for  that  last  act.  But  it  was  very  near  at  hand; 
it  would  burst  on  the  world  before  the  disciples  had  gone  over 
the  cities  of  Israel.  If  there  was  a  pause  before  the  final  act, 
it  was  not  strange ;  the  same  thing  happened  in  the  natural  world 
in  the  case  of  the  sower.'  Pfleiderer  thinks  much  the  same.  The 
point  of  the  sower  parable  he  takes  to  be  that  the  Kingdom  could 
only  be  prepared  for  by  the  proclamation  and  teaching  of  the  good 
tidings.  How  soon  precisely  the  seed  would  ripen  and  the  harvest 
come,  God  alone  knew.  There  is  no  idea  of  a  long  development 
or  process,  or  a  gradual  improvement  of  mankind  ( Urchristentum,  i. 
pp.  623, 624). 
I  And  Wrede  says  well :  '  It  may  be  allowed  therefore  that  the 

subject  of  development  is  treated  here,  but  it  is  not  a  develop- 
(  ment  in  this  world,  but  a  hidden  development  in  the  operations 
•  and  plans  of  God,  of  which  man  sees  nothing.  And  the  Elingdom 
■  does  not  develope  from  its  beginning  to  its  consummation,  so  that 
\    &t  the  end  it  is  something  different  from  what  it  was  at  the 


(f 


132  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  26-29 

beginning,  but  it  is  the  coming  of  the  one  and  the  selfsame  Kingdom 
which  gradually  draws  near'  (Wrede,  Vortrdge  und  Studien,  p.  112). 

J.  Weiss  thinks  that  the  parable  must  be  taken  in  close 
connection  with  the  former  parable  of  the  sower.  It  is  still 
the  Word  with  which  Jesus  is  here  concerned.  As  the  farmer 
sows  and  then  waits,  so  only  can  Jesus  fulfil  his  mission :  preaching, 
collecting,  preparing.  He  cannot  force  the  advent  of  the  Kingdom, 
any  more  than  the  farmer  can  force  the  appearance  of  the  fruit. 
Many  of  his  adherents  probably  urged  him  to  take  action,  but 
he  speaks  with  disapproval  of  those  who  would  seek  to  obtain 
the  Kingdom  by  violence  (Matt.  xi.  12).  The  actual  bringing 
of  the  Kingdom  is  not  the  work  of  man,  and  not  his  work ;  it 
is  God's  work ;  he  (Jesus)  has  to  proclaim  that  God  will  rule, 
and  that  man  must  prepare  himself  for  that  rule  and  make  himself 
worthy  of  it. 

Jiilicher  {Einleitung,  1906,  p.  286)  thinks  that  the  reason  for 
the  prominence  given  by  Mark  to  the  parable  of  the  sower — why 
he  chose  it,  out  of  the  many  parables  of  Jesus  which  he  must 
have  known,  as  an  example  of  the  Master's  teaching — is  that 
Mark  wanted  to  point  out  that  Jesus  had  foreseen  the  cleavage 
which  his  teaching  had  produced  among  his  people,  and  that 
he  had  predicted  and  explained  beforehand  the  slowness  of  the 
progress  of  his  cause.  Jesus  had  not  only  foreseen  everything 
which  had  happened,  but  he  had  not  even  wished  tilings  to  happen 
otherwise.  Even  at  60  or  70  a.d.  the  delay  in  the  arrival  or 
completion  of  the  Kingdom  must  have  seemed  a  huge  delay, 
sorely  needing  explanation,  to  the  believing  disciples.  What  would 
they  have  said  to  the  unarrived  or  uncompleted  Kingdom  after 
1 800  years ! 

I  feel  somewhat  doubtful  as  to  whether  this  remarkable  parable 
was,  as  Loisy  thinks,  taken  by  Mark  from  Q.  But  still  more 
sceptical  do  I  feel  towards  the  theory  of  B.  Weiss  that  the  parable 
is  only  a  free  adaptation  of  the  parable  of  the  tares  in  Matt, 
xiii.  24-30  (Quellen,  A,  p.  134).  This  seems  a  strange,  almost 
perverse  idea.  On  the  other  hand,  the  mustard  seed  parable,  now 
to  follow,  may  possibly  have  been  taken  from  Q. 


30-34.    The  Mustard  Seed 
(Cp.  Matt.  xiii.  31,  32;  Luke  xiii.  18,  19) 

30  And  he  said, '  Whereunto  shall  we  liken  the  kingdom  of  God  ? 

31  or  with  what  parable  shall  we  represent  it  ?    It  is  like  a  grain  of 
mustard  seed,  which,  when  it  is  sown  in  the  earth,  is  less  than 


IV.  30-34]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  133 

32  all  the  seeds  that  are  in  the  earth.  But  when  it  is  sown,  it 
groweth  up,  and  becometh  greater  than  all  herbs,  and  throweth 
out  great  branches :  so  that  the  birds  of  the  air  can  lodge  under 
the  shadow  of  it.' 

33  And  with  many  such  parables  spake  he  the  Word  unto  them, 

34  as  they  were  able  to  understand  it.  And  without  a  parable  spake 
he  not  unto  them :  but  when  they  were  alone,  he  explained  every- 
thing to  his  disciples. 

The  mustard  seed  is  the  Kingdom  as  represented  by  and 
existing  in  the  Christian  community.  From  small  and  lowly 
beginnings  it  is  destined  to  become  the  greatest  thing  on  earth, 
to  include  all  humanity  in  its  embrace.  Whether  the  fulfilment 
is  to  come  soon  is  not  stated,  but  it  is,  on  the  other  hand,  not 
implied  that  it  is  far  off. 

One  can  imagine  that  in  the  humble  beginnings  of  the 
Christian  community  the  parable  would  be  encouraging  and 
suggestive. 

In  this  parable  the  Kingdom — here  only  in  Mark — is  not 
the  Kingdom  of  the  future  which  on  a  renovated  earth  God  will 
himself  establish,  it  is  not  the  perfected  Divine  Rule  of  the  new 
era,  but  it  is  the  growing  Kingdom  as  represented  by  the 
Christian  community.  As  W.  says,  the  Kingdom  is  here  'das 
historisch  sich  entwickelnde,  nicht  das  eschatologische.'  And  the 
seed  is  not  the  Word,  but  the  Kingdom.  It  may  therefore  be 
questioned  whether  this  parable  was  really  spoken  by  Jesus. 
Wrede  makes  an  attempt  even  in  this  parable  to  preserve  for 
the  Kingdom  its  complete,  'ready  made,'  and  eschatological 
character.  But  the  attempt  is  hardly  successful,  and  he  himself 
puts  it  forward  somewhat  hesitatingly.  He  supposes  that  it  is 
not  the  Kingdom  which  grows  and  spreads,  but  the  circle  of 
those  who  are  to  possess  or  live  under  it. 

Of  the  thirteen  places  in  which,  in  Mark,  Jesus  speaks  of  the 
Kingdom,  this  is  the  only  passage  where  it  seems  definitely  to 
mean  the  growing  Christian  Church.  In  i.  14,  ix.  i,  47,  x.  23-25, 
xiv.  25,  its  eschatological  sense  seems  clear,  iv.  11,  26  do  not 
contradict  that  sense.  For  the  other  three  passages,  x.  14,  15, 
and  xii.  34,  see  the  notes  ad  loc.  Loisy  also  would  attempt  to 
keep  the  parable  for  Jesus,  It  is  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom, 
not  the  Christian  community,  which  was  originally  compared  to 
the  quick  growing  mustard :  the  parable  does  not  necessarily  set 
forth  the  rapid  expansion  of  Christianity,  but  its  object  is  to 
remove  the  doubt  which  the  humble  beginnings  of  the  gospel 
might  cause  as  to  its  fulfilment  in  the  Kingdom  {E.  S.  i.  p.  771). 


134  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  30-34 

But  was  this  doubt  one  which  could  have  arisen  within  the  year 
of  Jesus's  ministry  ?  Moreover  Jesus  did  not  say  that  his  gospel, 
humble  in  its  beginning,  would  grow  or  turn  into  the  Kingdom. 
He  simply  announced  that  the  advent  of  the  Kingdom  was  near, 
and  that  it  would  suddenly  liiake  its  appearance. 

31.  ov.  W.  points  out  that  ea-ri  is  really  the  meaning  here. 
The  participle  supplies  the  place  of  the  finite  verb.  The  mustard 
seed  is  at  first  the  smallest,  but  as  it  grows  it  becomes  the  largest 
of  plants. 

32.  There  is  a  reminiscence  of  Ezekiel  xvii.  23.  The  Messianic 
Kingdom  which  is  here  predicted  is  of  the  same  kind  as  that  of 
the  old  prophets  in  their  larger,  quieter,  and  more  universalistic 
moods.  It  is  to  be  a  Kingdom  of  peace  and  righteousness  and 
of  the  knowledge  of  God.  Jesus,  we  have  to  remember,  takes  up 
again  the  wider  messages  of  Isaiah,  and  even  of  Ezekiel  too,  it 
may  be  said,  in  such  momentary  phases  of  his  teaching  as  are 
reflected  in  xvii.  23,  where,  under  the  shadow  of  the  Tree  of 
Israel,  all  the  birds  of  every  wing  shall  dwell.  Cp.  also  Ezekiel 
xxxi.  6;  Dan.  iv.  12,  21. 

33  seems  to  indicate  that  Jesus  used  the  parable  to  help  his 
hearers  to  understand  his  meaning.  To  its  author — the  earher 
redactor — the  parables,  though  difficult,  were  nevertheless  spoken 
to  be  understood  by  all  who  heard  them,  so  far  as  their  capacities 
admitted.  34,  on  the  contrary,  follows  the  point  of  view  of  verses 
10  and  II.  It  is  the  work  of  the  latest  redactor,  who  thinks 
that  the  object  of  the  parables  was  to  darken  or  harden  the  Jews, 
and  who  even  forgets  that  Jesus  spoke  much  to  the  people  not  in 
parables  at  all. 

35-41.    Storm  at  Sea 
{Cp.  Matt.  viii.  18,  23-27;  Luke  viii,  22-25) 

35  And  the  same  day,  when  the  even  was  come,  he  said  unto 

36  them,  'Let  us  cross  over  unto  the  other  side.'     And  when  they 
had  dismissed  the  crowd,  they  took  him,  even  as  he  was,  in  the 

37  boat.     And  there  arose  a  great  storm  of  wind,  and  the  waves  beat 

38  upon  the  boat,  so  that  it  became  full.     And  he  was  in  the  stern  of 
the  boat,  asleep  on  a  pillow :  and  they  awoke  him,  and  said  unto 

39  him,  '  Master,  carest  thou  not  that  we  perish?'   And  he  arose,  and 
rebuked  the  wind,  and  said  [unto  the  sea],  '  Peace,  be  still.'    And 


IV.  35-41]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  135 

40  the  wind  dropped,  and  there  was  a  great  calm.     And  he  said  unto 

41  them,  '  Why  are  ye  so  fearful  ?  have  ye  still  no  faith  ? '  And  they 
feared  exceedingly,  and  said  one  to  another,  '  Who  is  this  man, 
that  even  the  wind  and  the  sea  obey  him?' 

B.  Weiss  supposes  that  there  was  a  storm  story  in  Q  from 
which  Mark  borrowed,  and  which  he  expanded.  He  cannot,  I  think, 
be  said  to  have  proved  his  case  (Quellen,  A,  pp.  166-169).  Loisy 
thinks  that  the  storm  story,  the  Gadarene  swine  story,  and  the 
daughter  of  Jairus  story,  were  already  combined  in  this  order  in 
Mark's  other '  narrative  source,'  and  that  Matthew  may  have  known 
and  used  this  source  as  well  as  Mark  {E,  S.  I.  pp.  89,  108,  125). 

35.  It  is  not  explained  what  the  motive  was  for  this  departure 
to  the  other  side  of  the  lake.  Was  it  to  gain  some  repose  or  to 
carry  the  tidings  to  other  centres  ?  On  the  other  side  of  the 
lake  there  were  indeed  many  Jews,  but  they  dwelt  amid  a  large 
number  of  pagans. 

36.  Jesus  is  still  in  the  boat.  The  disciples  '  take  him  with 
them,'  just  as  he  was,  without  further  preparation.  These  words, 
however,  are  due  to  the  redactor.  Originally  the  story  must  have 
meant  to  imply  that  Jesus  was  on  land,  and  that  he  determined 
to  cross  over  to  the  other  side  of  the  lake.  '  They  take  him  with 
them '  is  an  odd  phrase,  if  Jesus  is  already  with  them  in  the  boat ; 
'as  he  was'  is  added  to  mask  the  difficulty. 

The  remark  that  there  were  other  boats  present  too  has  no 
bearing  upon  the  story,  and  may  therefore  point  to  a  real  historic 
tradition. 

39.  Codex  Bezae  (D)  omits  'the  sea,'  W.  thinks,  rightly. 
For  it  is  the  wind  which  is  regarded  as  a  spirit,  not  the  sea. 

41.  Was  Jesus  justified  in  charging  them  with  want  of  faith? 
Hardly,  I  think.  It  may  be  said  that  a  man  in  a  storm  at  sea 
should  not  be  afraid,  because  he  should  not  fear  death,  but  it 
cannot  be  said  that  faith  in  God  will  of  itself  prevent  the  wreck 
of  the  ship  and  the  death  of  the  passengers.  Faith  should  make 
one  willing  either  to  die  or  to  live.     It  cannot  prevent  death. 

Dr  Carpenter  writes  dissenting.  'The  want  of  courage  is 
traced  to  lack  of  faith,  with  the  implication  that  the  man  who 
feels  himself  in  God's  hands  will  not  be  afraid  of  shipwreck  or 
death  or  anything.  He  can  meet  catastrophe  calmly.'  So  too 
Menzies.  But  I  think  this  is  too  modern.  The  narrator  clearly 
meant  that  they  should  have  faith  that  God  would  not  suffer  them 
to  perish. 


136  THE  SyNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IV.  35-41 

Wellhausen  has  an  interesting  note  on  the  relation  of  this 
story  to  the  story  of  Jonah.  But  I  think  he  underestimates  the 
importance  of  the  Old  Testament  stories  and  characters  in  the 
gradual  manufacture  (on  a  real  historical  basis)  of  the  life  of 
Jesus  as  recorded  in  the  S3moptic  Gospels.  This,  however,  is 
the  note,  and  my  readers  may  judge  for  themselves : 

'  That  he  sleeps  during  a  storm  at  sea  is  a  trait  which  Jesus 
shared  with  Jonah,  but  otherwise  there  is  no  similarity.  Our 
story  is  not  the  echo  of  the  story  of  Jonah.  And  in  general  the 
notion  that  the  Gospel  stories  owe  their  origin  to  Old  Testament 
types  is  seldom  true ;  it  is  usually  the  opposite  of  the  truth. 
What  was  known  and  reported  about  Jesus  did  not  agree  with 
what  is  said  in  the  Old  Testament  about  the  Messiah  or  with  what 
the  Jews  expected  of  him;  it  had  to  be  proved  with  difficulty 
that,  to  the  eyes  of  the  initiated,  the  contradiction  disappears. 
The  "original  Old  Testament  Gospel,"  as  Credner  called  it,  is 
really  something  additional,  and  not  the  kernel  of  the  whole ;  in 
Mark  it  is  almost  wholly  wanting;  it  is  most  apparent,  and  occupies 
most  space,  in  Matthew.' 

If  we  read  the  Jonah  story  in  the  Greek  version,  it  seems 
impossible  to  doubt  that  it  has  influenced  the  story  in  Mark. 
Gp.  Schmidt,  'Die  Komposition  des  Buches  Jona,'  in  Zdtschrift 
der  alttestamentlichen  Wissenschaft,  1905,  p.  298.  Yet  it  is  con- 
ceivable, as  J.  Weiss  earnestly  argues,  that  the  story  may  have 
a  historical  basis.  Jesus  sleeps  during  a  storm.  The  disciples 
in  their  fear  wake  him  up.  He  rebukes  them;  the  wind  soon 
drops.  Here  were  the  historic  materials  at  hand  for  a  miraculous 
tale.     Loisy  takes  much  the  same  line  {E.  S.  i.  p.  798) 


CHAPTER  V 

1-20.    The  Gadabene  Swine 
(Gp.  Matt.  viii.  28-34 ;  Luke  viii.  26-39) 

And  they  came  unto  the  other  side  of  the  lake,  to  the  country 

2  of  the  Gadarenes.  And  as  he  landed  from  the  boat,  immediately 
there  met  him  [out  of  the  tombs]  a  man  with  an  unclean  spirit, 

3  who  dwelt  among  the  tombs.    And  nobody  had  been  able  to  bind 

4  him  even  with  a  chain :  for  he  had  been  often  bound  with  fetters 
and  chains,  but  the  chains  had  been  torn  asunder  by  him,  and  the 
fetters  broken  in  pieces :  and  no  one  was  strong  enough  to  subdue 

5  him.    And  always,  night  and  day,  he  was  in  the  mountains  and 


I 


V.  1-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  1 37 

6  in  the  tombs,  shrieking,  and  cutting  himself  with  stones.     But 

7  when  he  saw  Jesus  afar  off,  he  ran  and  fell  down  before  him,  and 
cried  with  a  loud  voice,  and  said, '  What  have  I  to  do  with  thee, 
Jesus,  thou  Son  of  the  most  high  God  f    I  adjure  thee  by  God, 

8  that  thou  torment  me  not.'     (For  Jesus  had  said  unto  him, 'Come 

9  out  of  the  man,  thou  unclean  spirit.')  And  Jesus  asked  him, 
'  What  is  thy  name  ? '     And  he  answered,  saying,  '  My  name  is 

10  Legion :  for  we  are  many.'     And  he  besought  him  much  that  he 

11  would  not  send  them  away  out  of  the  land.     Now  there  was  there 
13  upon  the  mountain  a  great  herd  of  swine  feeding.     And  they 

besought  him,  saying,  'Send  us  into  the  swine,  that  we  may 

13  enter  into  th^m.'  And  Jesus  gave  them  leave.  And  the  unclean 
spirits  went  out,  and  entered  into  the  swine :  and  the  herd  rushed 
down  the  cliff  into  the  lake,  (they  were  about  two  thousand) ;  and 

14  they  were  drowned  in  the  lake.  And  the  swineherds  fled,  and 
told  the  story  in  the  city  and  in  the  country.     And  the  people 

15  came  out  to  see  what  had  happened.  And  they  came  to  Jesus,  and 
saw  him  that  was  possessed  with  the  demon,  sitting  down,  clothed 

16  and  in  his  right  mind :  and  they  were  afraid.  And  the  eye- 
witnesses told  them  what  had  happened  to  him  that  was  possessed 

17  with  the  demon,  and  also  about  the  swine.     And  they  began  to 

18  entreat  him  to  depart  out  of  their  territory.  And  as  he  was 
getting  into  the  boat,  the  man  who  had  been  possessed  with  the 

19  demon  entreated  him  that  he  might  go  with  him.  Howbeit  Jesus 
permitted  him  not,  but  said  unto  him,  '  Go  home  to  thine  own 
people,  and  tell  them  what  great  things  the  Lord  has  done  for 

20  thee,  and  how  he  has  had  compassion  upon  thee.'  And  he  de- 
parted, and  began  to  proclaim  publicly  in  the  Ten  Cities  what 
great  things  Jesus  had  done  for  him :  and  all  were  amazed. 

A  strange  story!  It  is  wonderful,  observes  W.,  that  this 
folk-tale  (dieser  Schwank)  should  have  been  attributed  to  Jesus. 
It  must  have  had  an  independent  origin.  'II  ressemble  a  un 
gros  conte  populaire'  (E.  S.  i.  p.  799). 

It  is  perhaps  enough  to  mention  here  that  B.  Weiss  supposes 
that  this  tale  also  formed  part  of  Q,  and  that  the  short  form  which 
it  assumes  in  Matthew  is  not  an  abbreviation  of  Mark,  but  in  the 
main  a  reproduction  of  Q.  Mark  has  expanded.  Loisy  more 
cautiously  confines  himself  to  saying:   'La  sobri^t^  du  recit  [of 


138  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [V.  1-20 

Matthew]  pourrait  tenir  en  partie  k  ce  que  Matthieu  a  connu  la 
source  dont  Marc  lui-m6me  depend '  {E.  S.  i.  p.  125). 

1.  '  There  are  three  forms  of  the  name  of  the  people  with 
whom  Jesus  is  now  brought  into  contact.  Matthew  has  Ga- 
darenes,  Luke  in  many  good  MSS.  has  Gergesenes.  But  Gardara, 
the  capital  of  Persea,  is  at  a  distance  from  the  Sea  (Lake)  of 
Galilee;  and  the  Gergesenes,  if  the  name  is  connected  with  a 
tribe  of  Girgashites  (Genesis  x.  16),  were  west  of  the  Jordan. 
In  Mark,  and  also  in  Luke,  the  reading  Gerasenes  is  best  sup- 
ported. It  cannot  refer  to  the  town  Gerasa,  on  the  frontier  of 
Persea,  which  is  about  thirty  miles  from  the  southern  end  of  the 
Sea  of  Galilee.  Modern  research  has  discovered  a  place  called 
Gersa  or  Khersa,  on  the  east  side  of  that  sea,  which  satisfies  the 
requirements  of  our  passage,  there  being  a  steep  slope  from 
the  high  ground  into  the  lake '  (Menzies).  The  inhabitants 
on  the  east  side  of  the  lake  were  mixed.  There  were  many 
pagans  as  well  as  Jews.     Hence  the  herd  of  swine. 

2.  The  '  possessed '  person  is,  in  this  case,  a  violent  madman. 
He  is  represented  as  dwelling  among  the  tombs,  inasmuch  as  he 
avoids  all  human  intercourse,  and  partly  because  the  popular 
belief  was  that  demons  liked  to  haunt  cemeteries. 

8  is  retrospective.     '  For  Jesus  had  said  to  him,'  &c. 

9.  As  the  unclean  spirit  is  to  go  into  a  herd  of  pigs,  there 
must  be  more  than  one  spirit.  This  verse  makes  and  explains 
the  transition  from  the  singular  to  the  plural.  Perhaps  Jesus 
asks  for  the  name,  because,  in  the  popular  idea,  in  order  to  lay 
a  spirit  effectually,  it  is  desirable  or  even  necessary  to  know  ite 
name.  It  was  also  part  of  the  popular  belief  that  demons  live  in 
herds  of  beasts,  and  that  a  whole  number  of  them  can  reside  in  a 
human  body.  A  demon  does  not  like  to  mention  his  name;  perhaps 
he  avoids  it  also  here,  and  gives  his  number  instead  (W.). 

10.  The  unclean  spirits  do  not  want  to  go  back  to  their  own 
place  (the  desert  or  hell) ;  they  can  easily  change  the  human  or 
animal  body  in  which  they  have  taken  up  their  abode. 

13,  14.  The  spirits  are  disappointed.  Their  wish  is  granted, 
and  yet  they  are  dispossessed  of  their  chosen  new  home.  The 
unclean  pigs  are  drowned,  and  their  heathen  owners  lose  2000 
beasts.  These  incidents  are  perhaps  part  of  a  popular  Jewish 
tale,  unconnected  originally  with  the  life  of  Jesus. 

In  his  book,  Das  dlteste  EvangeLium  (p.  188)  J.  Weiss  tried  hard 
to  argue  that  the  story  is  historical,  and  not  even  disagreeable  to 


V.  1-20]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 39 

those  who  can  see  a  little  deeper.  The  pigs  were  frightened  by 
the  man's  raging ;  he  rushed  at  them  in  his  final  paroxysm ;  they 
ran  in  their  fright  over  the  cliff.  The  man  had  a  sort  of  idde  fixe 
that  the  demons  inside  him  wanted  to  get  into  the  pigs.  These 
elaborate  attempts  do  not  seem  to  me  very  successful.  In  Weiss's 
later  commentary  on  the  Gospels  the  notion  that  the  man  had  a 
fixed  idea  that  the  demons  desired  to  leave  him  and  enter  the  pigs 
seems  to  have  been  wisely  dropped.  The  best  remarks  on  the 
origin,  growth,  and  meaning  of  the  story  are  to  be  found  in 
Carpenter's  First  Three  Gospels,  pp.  166-169. 

17.  They  ask  him  to  leave  partly,  perhaps,  because  they  do 
not  wish  to  lose  any  more  property,  partly  because  the  presence 
of  so  powerful  a  miracle-worker  makes  them  afraid. 

We  are  to  gather  that  they  are  not  Jews,  but  pagans.  Whether 
the  man  who  is  cured  is  a  Jew  or  not  is  uncertain.  Jesus  carries 
out  their  wishes  and  returns  to  the  Capernaum  side  of  the  lake. 
Have  we  here  a  sort  of  veiling  of  the  fact  that  this  attempt  at 
preaching  the  Kingdom  on  the  other  side  of  the  lake  was  for 
some  reason  or  other  a  failure  or  that  Jesus  had  to  return  ?  Loisy 
says :  '  Les  6vangelistes  ont  ^vit6  de  mettre  cet  echec  en  relief,  et 
J^sus  lui-m^me  a  pu  se  rendre  compte,  en  voyant  cette  population 
qui  dtait  en  partie  paienne,  que  le  terrain  n'etait  nuUement 
pr^pard'  (E.  S.  I.  p.  796). 

19.  Jesus  refuses  to  allow  the  man  to  become  one  of  his 
disciples ;  he  does  not  desire  to  have  a  stranger  among  his  own 
immediate  followers.  At  any  rate,  whatever  the  reason,  he  bids 
him  go  home  and  tell  his  family  what  the  Lord  (here  meaning 
God)  has  done  for  him.  If  the  man  was  a  pagan,  this  might 
mean  that  he  was  to  convert  his  family  to  the  knowledge  of  the 
one  true  God,  the  Lord  (Jehovah,  Yahweh). 

It  is  generally  supposed  that  this  bidding  of  Jesus  constitutes 
an  exception  to  the  usual  command  of  secrecy  and  silence.  It  is, 
however,  doubtful  whether  it  is  so,  for  the  man  is  only  bidden 
to  tell  his  family.  He  is  to  keep  within  the  privacy  of  his  house, 
whereas,  instead,  he  publishes  the  wonderful  cure  all  over  the 
Deoapolis,  but  Jesus  had  not  suggested  or  ordered  this.  On 
the  contrary,  the  words  of  the  order  look  rather  as  if  he  wished 
the  man  to  keep  among  his  own  household.  The  order,  there- 
fore, is  probably  no  exception  to  the  rule.  Gp.  viii.  26.  On  the 
opposite  hypothesis  we  can  adopt  some  such  explanation,  for 
example,  as  Gould's,  who  supposes  that  as  the  place  was  '  rarely 
visited '  by  Jews,  and  as  Jesus  now  had  to  leave  it,  the  publication 
of  the  story  could  only  do  good.  Here  were  no  enemies  to  mis- 
understand; no  injudicious  friends;   no  people  to  be  blinded  by 


I40  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [V.  1-20 

miracles  to  spiritual  work.  No  false  conception  of  the  Messiah 
would  be  aroused  as  in  Galilee.  Or,  again,  if  there  is  an  exception, 
it  may  be  that  Mark  has  here  forgotten  his  theory. 

20.  '  Decapolis,  the  ten  city  district,  is  the  name  applied  to 
the  cities,  east  of  the  Jordan,  liberated  by  Pompey  from  Jewish 
rule,  which  united  in  the  ten  city  alliance.  These  cities  had  been 
Hellenistic  since  the  Syrian  conquest,  had  been  conquered  and 
subjected  to  Jewish  rule  by  the  Maccabees,  and  were  finally 
liberated  by  Pompey'  (Gould). 

As  the  highest  portions  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  excel  the 
average  teachings  of  the  prophets,  so  the  lowest  portions  &11 
beneath  them.  How  pure  and  free  the  prophets  are  from  the 
superstitious  ideas  about  demons  and  demoniac  possession  to 
which  Jesus,  like  many  others  of  his  time,  was  a  victim ! 


21-43.    The  Daughter  of  Jairus  and  the  Woman 
WITH  AN  Issue 

{Cp.  Matt.  ix.  18-26;  Luke  viii.  40-56) 

21  And  when  Jesus  had  crossed  over  again  in  the  boat  unto  the 
other  side,  a  great  crowd  gathered  unto  him,  and  stood  by  the 

22  edge  of  the  lake.  And,  behold,  there  came  one  of  the  rulei-s  of 
the  synagogue,  Jairus  by  name ;  and  when  he  saw  him,  he  fell  at 

23  his  feet,  and  besought  him  greatly,  saying,  'My  little  daughter  lies 
at  the  point  of  death :  come  and  lay  thy  hands  on  her,  that  she 
may  be  healed,  and  may  live.' 

24  And  Jesus  went  with  him ;  and  a  great  crowd  followed  him, 

25  and  pressed  around  him.     And  a  woman,  who  had  had  an  issue 

26  of  blood  twelve  years,  and  had  suffered  much  from  many  physicians, 
and  had  spent  all  her  fortune,  and  was  not  benefited,  but  rather 

27  grew  worse,  having  heard  the  tales  about  Jesus,  came  up  in  the 

28  crowd,  and  touched  his  garment  from  behind.     For  she  thought, 

29  '  If  I  only  touch  his  clothes,  I  shall  be  cured.'  And  straightway 
the  source  of  her  issue  dried  up  ;  and  she  felt  in  her  body  that 

30  she  was  healed  of  her  affliction.  And  Jesus,  realizing  immediately 
that  power  had  gone  out  of  him,  turned  round  in  the  crowd,  and 

31  said,  'Who  touched  my  clothes?'  And  his  disciples  said  unto  him, 
'Thou  seest  the  crowd  pressing  around  thee,  and  thou  sayest, 


V.  21-43]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDING  TO  MARK  1 41 

32  Who  touched  me?'    And  he  looked  round  to  see  who  it  was  that 

33  had  done  it.  But  the  woman,  fearing  and  trembling — for  she 
knew  what  had  befallen  her — came  and  fell  down  before  him,  and 

34  told  him  all  the  truth.  But  he  said  unto  her,  '  Daughter,  thy 
faith  has  cured  thee ;  go  in  peace,  and  be  healed  of  thy  affliction.' 

35  While  he  yet  spake,  there  came  some  men  from  the  ruler  of 
the  synagogue's  house,  and  said,  '  Thy  daughter  is  dead :   why 

36  troublest  thou  the  Master  any  further?'  But  Jesus  overheard  the 
word  that  was  spoken,  and  said  unto  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue, 

37  'Be  not  afraid;  have  but  faith.'  And  he  allowed  no  man  to  go 
on  with  him,  except  Peter,  and  James,  and  John  the  brother  of 

38  James.    And  they  came  to  the  house  of  the  ruler  of  the  synagogue, 

39  and  he  heard  an  uproar,  for  they  wept  and  wailed  loudly.  And 
when  he  had  entered  in,  he  said  unto  them, '  Why  make  ye  this 

40  uproar,  and  weep  ?  the  child  is  not  dead,  but  sleeps.'  And  they 
laughed  him  to  scorn.  But  he  drove  them  all  out,  and  took  with 
him  only  the  father  and  the  mother  of  the  child,  and  his  com- 

41  panions,  and  entered  in  where  the  child  was  lying.  And  he  took 
the  hand  of  the  child,  and  said  unto  her,  '  Talitha  cumi ' ;  which 

42  is,  being  interpreted,  '  Maiden,  I  say  unto  thee,  arise.'  And 
straightway  the  girl  arose,  and  walked ;  for  she  was  twelve  years 
old.     And  they  were  utterly  beside  themselves  with  amazement. 

43  And  he  strictly  ordered  them  that  no  man  should  know  it ;  and 
he  said  that  something  should  be  given  her  to  eat. 

How  well  these  stories  are  told !  The  vivid  touches  are  mostly 
omitted  by  Matthew  {e.g.  26,  how  the  woman  had  seen  many 
doctors  and  been  put  to  much  expense). 

There  is  a  certain  inimitable  touch  of  sarcasm  at  the  pompous 
and  noisy  lamentations  (38)  for  the  girl  who  was  not,  after  all, 
really  dead. 

What  are  we  to  regard  as  the  basis  of  this  story?  Did  it 
happen  ?  Was  the  girl  really  not  dead  ?  Was  it  a  case  of 
apparent  death  only  ?  This  is  the  best  hypothesis.  But,  if  so, 
how  did  Jesus  realize  this  before  he  had  seen  the  girl  ?  Per- 
haps the  story  has  been  expanded  from  a  simpler  and  more 
natural  original.  The  tales  of  Elijah  and  Elisha  may  also  have 
been  of  influence  in  shaping  the  story  as  we  now  find  it.  Note 
the  charming  touch  at  the  end :  '  He  bade  them  give  her  some- 
thing to  eat.'     This  may  also  point  to  the  child  having  been  in 


142  THE  SVNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [V.  21-43 

some  sort  of  faint.  Loisy  thinks  the  motive  of  the  order  is  the 
same  as  that  of  the  order  for  silence.  The  child  is  not  to  be 
treated  as  a  resurrected  being.  Her  parents  are  to  act  as  if 
(which  is  the  case)  she  had  woke  up  after  a  long  sleep,  when  she 
would  naturally  need  some  food. 

M.  Loisy  tries  his  best  to  deal  with  the  story  as  if,  in  Mark  at 
any  rate,  we  had  to  do  with  a  most  accurately  reported  tale.  And 
I  think  that,  upon  the  whole,  this  is  a  reasonable  line  for  a 
commentator  to  take.  Let  him,  at  all  events  in  the  first  instance, 
do  his  best  with  the  narrative  before  him.  The  order  for  silence 
at  the  end  M.  Loisy,  here  as  elsewhere,  seeks  to  set  in  the  best 
possible  historical  relief.  See  below  on  verse  43.  But  finally  the 
difificulties  seem  to  surge  up  against  him,  and  he  adds :  '  It  must 
be  confessed  that  some  difficulty  is  caused  to  the  historian  by  the 
direction  to  keep  silence,  which,  in  spite  of  the  explanations  pre- 
viously given,  is  not  natural,  and  tends  to  throw  suspicion  on 
the  reality  of  the  event.  After  the  transfiguration,  the  same 
direction  wUl  be  met  again,  addressed  to  the  same  disciples: 
and  it  will  further  be  observed,  from  the  criticism  of  the  other 
narratives  in  which  Peter,  James,  and  John  appear,  that  the 
mention  of  the  three  apostles  is  not  a  guarantee  of  historicity. 
A  tradition,  the  subject  of  which  is  the  miracles  of  Jesus,  is  in- 
evitably legendary.  All  that  can  be  said  about  the  healing  of  the 
woman  with  an  issue  and  the  raising  of  Jairus's  daughter  is  that 
they  are  probably  not  myths,  and  that  they  proceed  firom  real 
incidents'  (E.  S.  i.  p.  826). 

In  36  the  words  '  Fear  not ;  only  believe,'  have  a  wonderfully 
solemn  and  beautiful  effect.  Whether  such  a  faith  was  reasonable 
need  not  here  be  discussed.  It  could  not  lightly  or  easily  be 
answered.     The  whole  story  is  told  with  consummate  art. 

Note  that  here  only  we  find  a  story  within  a  story.  (Gp., 
however,  iii.  20.)  The  interval  and  necessary  pause  between  the 
departure  of  Jesus  to  see  the  dying  girl  and  his  arrival  at  the 
house  are  admirably  filled  up  by  the  incident  of  the  woman  with 
the  issue. 

28.  '  The  woman  seeks  to  be  cured  in  this  surreptitious  way 
because  of  her  uncleanness '  (Gould). 

29.  iarai.  The  perfect  passive.  'The  conviction  flashed 
through  her  mind :  I  have  received  a  permanent  cure '  (Swete). 

34.  'Thy  faith  has  cured  thee.'  'In  x.  52  this  is  apparently 
to  be  taken  literally,  but  after  the  words  about  the  power  issuing 
from  Jesus  (30),  it  can  only  mean  here  that  her  faith  has  led  her 
to  the  true  agency  of  cure '  (Menzies). 


V.  21-43]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  143 

J.  Weiss  points  out  that  if  the  story  is  historical,  the  cure 
could  only  have  been  due  to  what  he  calls  '  auto-suggestion.'  The 
excitement  and  faith  of  the  woman  cause  the  blood  to  cease 
flowing.  But  then  the  explanation  of  Mark,  and  Jesus's  feeling 
that  'power'  had  gone  out  of  him,  must  be  abandoned.  Prof. 
Bennett  is  very  clever  in  trying  to  put  the  miraculous  or  semi- 
miraculous  incidents  in  such  a  way  that  (a)  they  become  more 
credible,  and  (b)  that  they  redound  to  the  unique  greatness  of 
his  hero.  Thus  here  he  says :  '  He  was  sensitive  to  influences 
which  did  not  affect  others.  In  this  incident  He  distinguished 
the  woman's  timid  touch  amid  the  pressure  of  the  jostling  crowd, 
as  a  mother,  even  in  her  sleep,  singles  out  her  infant's  feeble  cry 
from  a  babel  of  loud  noises.  There  was,  so  to  speak,  an  emotional 
circuit  set  up  between  Him  and  her,  so  that  He  felt  the  shock 
of  her  importunate  demand  for  healing  and  the  immediate  drain 
upon  His  mysterious  forces.  By  such  an  experience  even  He  was 
startled '  (op.  cit.  p.  77). 

36.  irapaKovcra';.  The  meaning  is  not  quite  certain.  It  may 
mean  simply  '  overheard.'  On  the  basis  of  the  usage  of  the  word 
in  the  Septuagint,  Swete  explains  that  Jesus  heard,  but  heeded 
not.  He  spoke  as  if  he  had  not  heard,  passed  the  words  by  in 
silence,  and  followed  his  own  course. 

39.  '  She  is  not  dead,  but  sleeps.'  Jesua  says  this  before  he 
has  seen  the  child.  He  is  still  sure  that  she  is  not  really  dead. 
Jesus  himself  does  not  believe  that  he  is  going  to  perform  the 
miracle  of  bringing  the  dead  to  life.  From  first  to  last  he  is 
convinced  that  the  child  is  not  dead.  Prof.  Bennett  has  a  good 
remark  here  from  his  own  special  point  of  view.  He  says :  '  Jesus 
had  set  out  for  Jairus's  house  in  the  assured  conviction  that  He 
was  going  to  heal  the  child ;  the  news  of  her  death  seemed  in- 
credible because  He  was  not  conscious  of  any  power  or  commission 
to  raise  the  dead.  So  that  if  they  were  right.  His  conviction  that 
He  was  going  to  heal  the  child  was  a  mistake.  That  was  im- 
possible, therefore  He  knew  that  she  was  not  dead.  This  view 
may  have  been  confirmed  to  Him  by  some  mysterious  intuition, 
such  as  that  by  which  He  was  made  aware  of  the  woman's  touch 
and  its  meaning '  (p.  78). 

J.  Weiss  has  good  remarks  upon  the  amazing  faith  of  Jesus. 
If,  as  he  says,  the  story  is  not  a  mere  legend,  it  can  only  be 
explained  upon  the  strength  of  this  faith,  which  other  stories 
equally  reveal.  This  faith  was  a  fundamental  feature  of  his 
character,  which  can  neither  be  explained  nor  described;  one 
may  approve  of  it  or  not,  it  has  to  be  recognized.  His  faith 
was  a  sort  of  inspiration,  which  overcame  him  with  overmastering 


144  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [V.  21-43 

power.  So  far  as  we  know,  this  faith  during  the  period  of  his 
brief  ministry  did  not  play  him  false,  except  perhaps  at  Nazareth. 
Whether  xv.  34  means  a  disappointment  of  faith  is  disputed. 

43.  The  order  for  concealment  is  hard  to  credit  here.  How- 
could  Jesus  have  imagined  that  it  could  be  obeyed  ?  Moreover, 
there  was  the  child  alive  whom  everybody  had  supposed  to  be 
dead.  The  order  is,  one  may  suppose,  merely  inserted  by  Mark 
in  accordance  with  his  general  theory.  Perhaps  it  is  fair  to  give 
Loisy's  defence  of  the  prohibition.  'If  Jesus  forbids  them  to 
relate  what  has  happened,  it  is  in  order  that  there  may  be  no 
talk  about  the  miracle,  and  that  it  may  not  be  announced  as 
a  resurrection.  Let  who  will  say  that  the  child  was  not  quite 
dead ;  no  one  is  to  contradict  it.  Jesus  is  not  desirous  that  people 
should  believe  that  he  has  come  to  raise  the  dead,  as  he  heals  the 
sick,  and  he  fears  lest  the  fame  of  such  an  extraordinary  prodigy 
should  excite  an  untimely  movement  in  public  opinion.  A  con- 
siderable number  of  persons  had  heard  that  the  daughter  of  Jairus 
was  dead,  but  only  a  few  had  entered  the  child's  room,  and  what 
Jesus  himself  had  said  might  have  aided  the  belief  that  she  had 
only  swooned.  If  the  parents  did  not  speak  and  Jesus  was  absent, 
soon  nothing  more  would  be  thought  of  the  matter'  {E.  S.  I. 
p.  82s). 

As  with  the  preceding  story,  so  here  too  it  is  disputed  whether 
Mark  has  expanded  from  Q,  or  whether  Matthew  has  contracted 
from  Mark.  The  most  interesting  point  comes  in  as  regards  verse  30. 
W.,  who,  of  course,  holds  that  Mark  did  not  know  Q,  thinks  that 
Matthew  omitted  this  part  of  Mark's  story  because  it  was  distasteful 
.  to  him.  B.  Weiss,  on  the  contrary,  thinks  that  in  the  original 
story,  as  (in  his  opinion)  it  was  found  and  read  by  Mark  in  Q,  this 
'  material '  explanation  of  the  miracle  was  wanting.  If  Matt.  is.  21 
was  in  Q  and  not  merely  taken  from  Mark  v.  28,  it  was  only  the 
woman  who  (wrongly)  thought  that  to  be  cured  she  must  touch 
Jesus's  dress.  What  really  cured  her  was  her  faith  and  her  faith 
only,  even  as  Jesus  says  in  Matt.  ix.  22,  Mark  v.  34.  Loisy, 
though  he  leaves  the  question  open  whether  the  source  of  Mark 
was  known  to  Matthew,  nevertheless  thinks  that  Mark  is  here 
more  original  than  Matthew.  The  words,  'thy  faith  has  healed 
thee,'  really  presuppose  '  that  the  miracle  has  been  accomplished 
without  Jesus  having  intended  it.'  The  healing  was  prior  to 
Jesus's  utterance,  and  not  after  it  or  at  the  same  time  with  it. 
The  traits  which  Matthew  suppresses  are  just  those  which  plead 
for  the  historicity  of  the  story  {E.  S.  i.  p.  818). 


VI.  1-6]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  I4S 

CHAPTER  VI 

1-6.    The  Cold  Reception  of  Jesus  at  Nazareth 
{Gp.  Matt.  xiii.  53-58 ;  Luke  iv.  16-30) 

1  And  he  went  out  from  thence,  and  entered  into  his  native 

2  city ;  and  his  disciples  followed  him.  And  when  the  sabbath  day 
was  come,  he  began  to  teach  in  the  synagogue:  and  many,  hearing 
him,  were  astonished,  saying,  '  Whence  has  this  come  to  him  ? 
what  wisdom  is  this  which  has  been  given  unto  him  ?  and  have 

3  such  miracles  been  wrought  by  his  hands  ?  Is  he  not  the 
carpenter,  the  son  of  Mary,  the  brother  of  James,  and  Joses,  and 
Juda,  and  Simon  ?  and  are  not  his  sisters  here  with  us  ? '    And 

4  they  took  offence  at  him.  But  Jesus  said  unto  them,  '  A  prophet 
is  not  without  honour,  except  in  his  own  city,  and  among  his 

5  kin,  and  in  his  house.'  And  he  could  not  perform  there  a  single 
miracle,  save  that  he  laid  his  hands  upon  a  few  sick  folk,  and 

6  healed  them.  And  he  marvelled  because  of  their  unbelief.  So  he 
went  about  the  villages  around,  teaching. 

1.  Jesus  now  attempts  another  missionary  enterprise.  He 
will  essay  to  preach  the  tidings  in  his  own  native  village.  But 
for  different  reasons  his  venture  at  Nazareth  is  as  much  a  failure 
as  his  venture  on  the  other  side  of  the  lake. 

2,  3.  There  seems  some  little  confusion  in  the  narrative. 
What  his  fellow  townsmen  say  about  him  must  refer,  at  least 
partially,  to  his  reputation,  for  he  did  no  wonders  at  Nazareth. 
'  To  be  astonished  at '  is  elsewhere  used  as  nearly  equivalent  to 
wonder  and  admiration.  But  the  men  of  Nazareth,  on  the  contrary, 
cannot  see  anything  so  very  wonderful  in  his  teaching. 

It  is,  however,  quite  possible  that  what  the  Evangelist  means 
to  suggest  is  that  they  were  half  amazed,  half  annoyed.  They 
are  half  inclined  to  marvel  and  believe,  but  this  very  half-belief 
makes  them  the  more  irritated  and  incredulous.  His  teaching 
seems  very  wise ;  but  yet  how  could  this  man,  whose  family  they 
know  so  well — just  ordinary  people — say  such  wise  things  ?  He 
was  no  Rabbi  by  profession,  and  had  not  frequented  any  Rabbinic 
schooh  It  is  impossible.  This  seems  trae  to  human  nature.  They 
do  not  want  to  believe.     If  Jesus  were  a  veritable  prophet,  it 

M.  1° 


146  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  1-6 

would  be  annoying.  'We  are  as  good  as  he,  but  we  could  not 
teach  as  he  does,  and  we  could  not  do  the  wonders  which  he  is 
said  to  have  done.  Therefore,  after  all,  his  teaching  is  not  wise, 
and  he  did  not  do  the  wonders ! ' 

3.  The  'carpenter,  the  son  of  Mary'  in  Mark  as  compared 
with  the  'son  of  the  carpenter'  in  Matt,  xiii  55  and  'son 
of  Joseph'  in  Luke  iv.  22,  is  very  noteworthy.  Perhaps,  as 
J.  Weiss  argues,  it  rests  upon  a  later  manipulation  of  the  text. 
The  Mark  which  Matthew  and  Luke  knew  probably  had  a  reading 
more  like  theirs.  Why  should  they  have  changed  it  ?  Indeed, 
Merx  points  out  that  there  is  good  evidence,  drawn  from  the 
Armenian  and  a  MS.  of  the  old  Latin  translation,  that  the  earliest 
form  was  '  the  son  of  the  carpenter  Joseph  and  of  Mary.'  In  his 
text  Loisy  defends  the  accuracy  and  priority  of  the  reading  in  Mark 
(as  we  have  it  now)  as  against  the  reading  of  Matthew  and  Luke, 
but  in  a  footnote  (E.  S.  i.  p.  833,  n.  6)  he  turns  round  and  is  inclined 
to  accept  Merx's  suggestion. 

5.  This  strong  expression,  'He  could  do  no  wonder  there,' 
is  only  found  in  Mark.  To  perform  his  miracles  Jesus  usually 
needed  a  predisposition  of  faith,  and  a  certain  excited  expectation 
of  success.  The  few  healings  are  apparently  not  regarded  by  the 
narrator  as  miracles.  Did  Jesus  try  and  fail  ?  Prof  Bennett  seeks 
to  avoid  this  conclusion.  He  says  Jesus  did  not  try.  For  (a)  his 
fellow  townsmen  did  not  believe  he  could  succeed  (and  therefore, 
I  suppose,  brought  no  difiScult  cases  to  him),  and  (b)  he  himself 
did  not  feel  the  spiritual  impulse  which  moved  him  to  undertake 
miracles,  and  assured  him  of  power  to  perform  them  (p.  82). 
Holtzmann,  on  the  contrary,  holds  that  Jesus  tried  and  failed. 
The  greater  the  evidence  for  the  historical  character  of  Mark's 
narrative :  '  It  makes  a  deep  impression  of  historical  accuracy 
(verse  5)  when  we  hear  how  in  the  face  of  such  unbelief,  even 
Jesus's  power  to  perform  miracles  fails.  It  became  exhausted,  as 
soon  as  the  indispensable  conditions  which  call  out  his  conscious- 
ness of  power  are  wanting'  (Holtzmann,  in  loc).  Loisy  seems 
inclined  to  agree.  '  If  he  were  unable  to  perform  miracles  in  his 
own  country,  it  was  not  owing  to  a  momentary  failure  of  power, 
but  to  lack  of  faith  in  those  on  whom  this  power  might  have  been 
exercised.  A  few  sick  people  only  had  confidence  enough  to  be 
healed.  However  the  mention  of  these  cures  looks  like  a  rectifying 
gloss,  which  the  compiler  has  added  to  a  narrative  which  included 
no  miracle'  {R  S.  i.  p.  837). 


VI.  7-13]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  147 


7-13.    The  Sending  of  the  Twelve 

(Cp.  Matt.  ix.  35-38,  X,  I,  S-16,  xi.  i ;  Luke  ix.  1-6,  x.  1-12, 

xiii.  22) 

7  And  he  called  unto  him  the  Twelve,  and  began  to  send  them 
forth  by  two  and  two;   and  he  gave  them  power  over  unclean 

8  spirits ;  and  he  commanded  them  that  they  should  take  nothing 
for  their  journey,  save  a  staff  only ;  no  bread,  no  wallet,  no  money 

9  in  their  purse.     They  were  only  to  be  shod  with  sandals ;  and 

0  they  were  not  to  put  on  two  coats.     And  he  said  unto  them, 
'  Wheresoever  ye  enter  into  an  house,  there  abide  till  ye  depart 

1  thence.     And  whatever  place  will  not  receive  you,  nor  hear  you, 
depart   thence,  and   shake  off  the  dust   under  your  feet,  as  a 

2  testimony  against  them.'     And  they  went   forth,  and  preached 

3  that  men  should  repent.     And  they  cast  out  many  demons,  and 
anointed  with  oil  many  that  were  sick,  and  healed  them. 

Jesus  is  not  daunted  by  his  failure  at  Nazareth.     He  proceeds 
to  the  '  villages  round  about,'  and  sets  forth  his  teaching  to  their 
inhabitants.     Of  what  happens  there,  and  how  he  fared,  we  are 
told  nothing.     The  narrative  passes  on  to  quite  different  matters. 
We  are  informed  that  Jesus  determines  to  make  his  chosen 
disciples  partners  in  his  work.     It  is  too  large  for  one  man.     The 
Great  Day  might  dawn,  the  Kingdom  might  come,  and  how  few 
Israelites — even  in  Galilee — would  have  had  an  opportunity  to 
repent  and  be  saved.     Therefore  let  six  small  companies  traverse 
through  the  land,  warning  and  healing.     Was  the  mission  of  the 
Twelve  also  due  to  the  growing  difficulties  and  opposition  which 
Jesus  had  experienced  ?    So  thinks  Loisy,  who,  with  B.  Weiss,  also 
maintains  that  Mark  drew  this  section  from  the  same  source  (Q) 
whence  Matthew  and  Luke  take  their  longer  speeches  to  the 
disciples.     '  Visiblement  emprunt^  a  une  relation  plus  complete,' 
i    he  says  in  the  Introduction  (E.  S.  p.  89).    In  the  Commentary  he  is 
i   slightly  more  cautious.     Thus  he  says :  '  After  the  first  difficulties 
t    which  the  Pharisees  threw  in  his  way,  and  above  all  in  the  presence 
;    of  the  popular  movement  which  increased  around  him,  Jesus  had 
J  chosen  the  twelve  apostles ;    henceforward  he  usually  had  them 
with  him,  and  he  prepared  them  to  help  him ;  lastly,  having  ex- 
perienced the  hostility  of  the  Pharisees  and  of  the  Gerasenes,  the 
indifference  and  coldness  of  his  fellow-citizens  and  his  relatives,  he 

10 — 2 


148  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  7-J3 

decided  to  associate  his  disciples  with  his  work  of  evangelisation. 
The  selection  and  the  mission  are  two  correlative  facts,  and  as  it 
were  two  outstanding  points  in  the  general  plan  of  the  .lecond 
Gospel.  The  editor  seems  to  attach  more  importance  to  the 
mission  even  than  to  the  instruction  which  is  connected  with  it,  for 
he  evidently  abridges  the  latter,  and  it  is  difficult  to  believe  that 
he  is  not  depending  on  a  written  source  in  which  the  mission 
serves  as  a  motive  for  a  discourse  of  considerable  length,  as  in 
Matthew.  This  source  must  be  that  on  which  Matthew  draws 
himself,  and  whence  also  comes  the  speech  which  in  Luke  is 
addressed  to  the  seventy-two  disciples'  {E.  S.  L  p.  856). 

On  the  other  hand,  we  have  W.  regarding  the  section  as  a 
later  insertion  ('eindem  Grundplan  fremdes  Zwischenstuck'),  and, 
moreover,  as  entirely  unhistorical.  Thus  he  writes  about  both 
iii.  13-19  and  vi.  7-13:  'They  contain  no  historic  traditions.  The 
order  of  the  apostles  (das  Apostolat)  is  (thus  early)  founded  by 
Jesus,  but  nevertheless  no  practical  results  ensue.  The  twelve 
make  an  experiment,  and  are  afterwards  just  as  dependent  and 
passive  as  before,  although  the  experiment  is  supposed  to  succeed. 
In  truth,  Jesus  arranged  no  trial  journeys  for  his  "seminary." 
But,  as  witness  and  evidence  for  the  manner  of  the  oldest  Christian 
mission  in  Palestine,  these  instructions  have  great  value.'  J.  Weiss 
thinks  that  to  question  the  historical  character  of  Jesus  sending 
out  his  disciples  upon  missionary  work  in  his  lifetime  is  unnecessary 
hypercriticism.  Why  should  he  not  have  done  so  ?  The  possible 
harvest  was  great ;  his  own  opportunities  and  powers  were  limited; 
the  Great  Day,  which  would  bring  the  Kingdom,  was  near  at  hand 
The  setting  and  the  instructions  may  belong  to  a  subsequent 
generation. 

7.  '  He  gave  them  power  over  the  unclean  spirits.'  This  is 
enlarged  in  Matt.  xL  by  the  addition  '  and  to  cure  every  malady  and 
sickness.'  What  are  we  to  suppose  that  Mark  meant  by  this, 
and  is  the  assertion  historical  ?  Neither  question  is  easy  to 
answer.  I  cannot  help  feeling  exceedingly  dubious  as  to  its 
historical  character.  That  Jesus  felt  that  he  had  been  given 
power  by  God  to  expel  demons  is  likely  enough.  But  that  he 
felt  that  he  could  delegate  or  pass  on  this  power,  seems  far  less 
probable.  Was  it  not  a  power  to  be  won  from  God  by  faith 
rather  than  handed  on  as  by  magic?  For  how  can  we  assign 
any  meaning  to  what  Jesus  is  here  said  to  do,  except  one  which 
is  at  least  semi-magical  (cp.  Acts  viii.  15-19,  xix.  6  referred  to 
by  Holtzmann).  If  they  were  to  expel  and  cure  by  invoking  the 
name  of  Jesus  (as  Loisy  thinks,  cp.  ix.  38),  what  is  this  but  naked 
supernaturalism  or  magic  ?     But  this  does  not  seem  in  keeping 


VI.  7-13]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDING  TO  MABK  149 

with  the  character  of  Jesus.  It  may  be  noted  that  B.  Weiss 
supposes  that  Jesus  really  only  gave  the  apostles  power  to  heal 
sicknesses.  This  was  all  that  Q  mentioned  as  we  still  can  see  in 
Luke  X.  9.  It  is  Mark  who  added  (unhistorically)  the  expulsion 
of  demons.  B.  Weiss  thinks  that  Luke  x.  17  is  a  proof  of  his 
suggestion.  'Even  (or  also)  the  demons  were  subject  to  us  in  thy 
name.'  They  are  quite  astonished  at  this;  it  was  unexpected, 
and  beyond  the  powers  which  had  been  originally  entrusted  to 
them  {Quellen,  A,  pp.  124-131). 

8.  The  apostles  are  to  take  no  luggage  or  provisions  with 
them :  even  their  attire  is  to  be  most  simple ;  one  coat  must  suflSce. 
Not  even  copper  money  are  they  to  carry. 

11.  TOTTo?,  says  W.,  means  here  no  more  than  house.  But 
this  does  not  seem  necessary.  It  may  refer  to  a  locality  in  which 
no  friendly  house  is  found.  Bousset  holds  that  Mark  has  repro- 
duced his  original  (Q)  unclearly.  The  point  is  that  in  each  place 
(totto?)  the  apostles  are  to  choose  one  house  and  stick  to  it.  '  For 
a  testimony  unto  them ' :  i.e.  to  indicate  to  them  that  all  intercourse 
with  them  is  utterly  cut  off.  No  attempt  is  to  be  made  to  convert 
the  unwilling.  He  who  will  not  hear  must  be  left  to  his  fate. 
There  is  no  time  for  delay.  Before  the  Kingdom  has  fully  come 
there  is  ever  so  much  still  to  do.  B.  Weiss  affirms  with  his  usual 
emphatic  positiveness  (one  cannot  help  wishing  that  all  was  really 
so  '  offenbar '  and  '  unwiderleglich '  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels  as  this 
venerable  and  distinguished  scholar  supposes)  that  what  Luke  has 
in  X.  1 1  (Q)  is  primitive  as  compared  with  Mark  vi.  1 1.  A  symbolic 
speech  has  been  turned  by  Mark  into  a  symbolic  act.  Holtzmann 
is  inclined  to  agree.  Loisy  thinks  the  explanation  is  different. 
Luke's  '  symbolic  speech '  is  due  to  conveniences  of  redaction,  so 
that  he  may  not  have  to  repeat  textually  what  he  had  already 
said  in  ix.  5.     For  the  whole  passage,  cp.  Acts  xiii.  51. 

12.  Repentance  is  the  main  burden  of  the  original  message 
of  Jesus,  in  accordance  with  Mark  i.  14.  The  new  era  is  hard  at 
hand ;  it  has,  indeed,  already  begun.  They  who  would  reap  good 
from  it  and  not  evil  must  repent  of  their  sins. 

13.  Anointing  with  oil  is  only  here  mentioned  in  the  Gospels. 
Op.  James  v.  14. 

M.  Loisy  observes:  'Although  such  anointings  were  of  frequent 
use  in  ancient  medicine,  the  reference  here  is  not  to  a  purely  medical 
prescription,  since  it  is  presumed  that  the  cures  are  miraculous. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  oil  cannot  be  regarded  as  merely  a  symbol 
of  the  supernatural  power  of  the  apostles,  for  it  forms  a  real  means 


I50  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VL  7-13 

by  which  the  healing  is  achieved.  In  that  age  and  in  that  environ- 
ment, the  idea  of  purely  natural  medicine  did  not  exist,  and  the 
art  of  healing  was  more  or  less  confused  with  magic,  the  remedies 
being  charms.  The  anointing  of  which  Mark  speaks  partakes  at 
once  of  the  nature  of  a  religious  rite,  as  the  exorcisni  by  which 
the  demons  are  driven  out,  in  so  far  as  a  divine  virtue  is  supposed 
to  be  attached  to  it,  and  of  a  remedy,  in  so  far  as  real  efficacy  in 
healing  was  attributed  to  the  element  itself  (E.  S.  I.  p.  901). 

'Apostolic '  poverty  was  a  new  thing  in  Judaism.  The  ptaise 
and  worship  of  poverty  may  not  be  the  highest  righteousness  and 
verity,  but  yet  they  constitute  a  wonderful  phase  of  human  good- 
ness, a  wonderful  chapter  in  the  history  of  man.  Doubtless  they 
wrought  evil  as  well  as  good ;  but  without  them,  without  such 
gospel  passages  as  these,  there  would  have  been  no  St  Francis. 
And  surely  the  world  would  be  much  poorer  without  the  Sacrum 
Gommercium  and  the  Fioretti,  and  poorer  still  without  the  life, 
personality,  and  example  of  St  Francis  himself.  See  also  Ad- 
ditional Note  16. 


14-29.    Jesus,  Hebod  Antipas,  and  John  the  Baptist 
(Gp.  Matt.  xiv.  1-12 ;  Luke  ix.  7-9,  iii.  19,  20) 

14  And  king  Herod  heard  of  him :  for  his  name  became  known. 
And  some  said,  'John  the  Baptist  is  risen  from  the  dead,  and 

15  therefore  miraculous  powers  are  active  in  him.'  Others  said,  'It 
is  Elijah.'     And  others  said,  '  He  is  a  prophet,  like  one  of  the 

16  prophets.'  But  when  Herod  heard  of  him,  he  said,  'John,  whom 
I  beheaded,  is  risen  from  the  dead.' 

17  For  Herod  himself  had  sent  and  seized  John,  and  bound  him 
in  prison  on  account  of  Herodias,  his  brother  Philip's  wife :  for  be 

18  had  married  her.     For  John  had   said  unto   Herod,  '  It  is  not 

19  lawful  for  thee  to  have  thy  brother's  wife.'     Therefore  Herodias 

20  hated  him,  and  would  have  killed  him,  but  she  could  not :  for 
Herod  feared  John,  knowing  that  he  was  a  righteous  and  holy 
man,  and  he  protected  him ;  and  when  he  heard  him,  he  was  much 

21  perplexed,  and  yet  he  heard  him  gladly.  Now  on  an  opportune 
day,  when  Herod  on  his  birthday  gave  a  banquet  to  his  lords  and 

22  high  captains,  and  to  the  chief  men  of  Galilee,  the  daughter  of 
Herodias  came  in,  and  danced,  and  pleased  Herod  and  his  guests. 
And  the  king  said  unto  the  damsel,  '  Ask  of  me  whatsoever  thou 


VI.  14-29]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  151 

23  wilt,  and  I  will  give  it  thee.'     And  he  sware  unto  her,  '  What- 
soever thou  shalt  ask  of  me,  I  will  give  it  thee,  even  unto  the 

24  half  of  my  kingdom.'     And  she  went  forth,  and  said  unto  her 
mother,  '  What  shall  I  ask  ? '    And  she  said,  '  The  head  of  John 

25  the  Baptist.'     And  she  went  in  straightway  with  haste  unto  the 
king,  and  asked,  saying, '  I  wish  that  thou  give  me  forthwith  the 

26  head  of  John  the  Baptist  on  a  dish.'    And  the  king  was  exceeding 
sorry;  yet  on  account  of  his  oath,  and  on  account  of  his  guests, 

27  he  did  not  like  to  refuse  her.     So  the  king  at  once  sent  an 
executioner,  and  ordered  him  to  bring  John's  head :  and  he  went, 

28  and  beheaded  him  in  the  prison,  and  brought  his  head  on  a  dish, 
and  gave  it  to  the  damsel:  and  the  damsel  gave  it  to  her  mother. 

29  And  when  his  disciples  heard  of  it,  they  came  and  took  away  his 
corpse,  and  buried  it  in  a  tomb. 

With  this  section  begins,  according  to  W.,  the  first  portion  of 
the  second  main  division  of  Mark,  which  first  portion  goes  down 
to  viii.  26,  and  is  named  by  W.,  '  Jesus  auf  unsteter  Wanderung.' 

The  section  before  us  now,  14-29,  is  intended,  in  the  present 
form  of  Mark,  'to  occupy  the  attention  of  the  reader'  (to  use 
Loisy's  words)  between  the  departure  of  the  Twelve  and  their 
return,  in  verse  30.  It  is,  as  he  says,  a  '  veritable  hors-d'csuvre 
qui  pourrait  avoir  6t6  substitu^  delib^rement  a  quelque  iadication 
touchant  I'attitude  hostile  que  le  t6trarque  avait  prise  k  I'^gard 
de  Jesus '  (E.  S.  I.  p.  90).  Loisy  has  here  accepted  as  probable 
the  views  of  W.  That  scholar  holds  that  this  part  of  Mark  has 
been  much  touched  up  and  altered  by  a  late  redaction.  The  real 
connection  of  events  was  darkened.  In  our  present  text,  14-29 
is  only  used  to  fill  up  the  interval  between  the  sending  out  of  the 
apostles  and  their  return.  Herod  cannot  originally  have  merely 
served  to  fill  this  gap.  Nor  can  he  have  been  dragged  in  merely 
to  give  an  opportunity  for  telling  the  story  about  the  Baptist's 
death.  Herod  must  have  belonged  to  the  proper  connection  of 
events  ;  his  appearance  at  this  juncture  in  the  story  of  Jesus  must 
have  had  some  point  and  importance. 

Now  in  vi.  45  Mark  makes  Jesus  leave  the  territory  of  Herod, 
and  go  on  to  ground  where  Herod  had  nothing  to  say ;  he  appears 
in  the  Decapolis,  in  the  territory  of  Philip,  and  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  Tyre  and  Sidon ;  afterwards  he  passes  through  Galilee, 
but  secretly  (ix.  30),  and  only  on  the  way  to  Jerusalem. 

According  to  the  oldest  tradition  the  reason  for  all  this  must 
have  been  his  fear  of  Herod  Antipas.     And  therefore  Herod's 


152  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  14-29 

'hearing'   of  Jesus   stands  at  (and  forms)   a   turning-point   in 
Jesus's  life. 

Thus  W.  conjectures  that  14-16  must  originally  have  ended 
with  an  indication  of  danger,  a  threat  at  Jesus's  life.  Why  is 
this  now  omitted?  The  answer  can  be  elicited  from  Luke  xiii.  31. 
There  Jesus  is  advised  to  depart,  because  '  Herod  would  fain  kill 
thee.'  He  answers  that  he  mu.st  indeed  soon  depart,  not  because 
of  Herod,  but  because  he  must  die  in  Jerusalem  and  not  elsewhere. 
Clearly  it  was  not  liked  that  the  motive  of  Jesus's  departure  from 
Galilee  should  be  his  fear  of  Herod.  Hence  it  was  desired  to 
cancel  the  hostility  of  Antipas  against  John  and  Jesus  altogether, 
and  to  turn  the  villain  into  a  good  man.  In  Mark  (17-29)  he 
likes  to  listen  to  John,  and  is  miserable  that  he  cannot  save  his 
life.  The  guilt  of  his  execution  is,  as  far  as  may  be,  removed 
from  him  and  assigned  to  Herodias.  In  Luke  xxiii.  15  he  says 
that  Jesus  is  guiltless.  And  whereas  in  Luke  xiii.  31  he  wants 
to  kill  him,  in  Luke  ix.  9  he  desires  to  see  him. 

14,  He  '  heard.'  What  did  he  hear  ?  It  is  usually  said  that 
he  heard  about  the  despatch  of  the  apostles.  W.,  however  (like 
Matthew  and  Luke),  thinks  differently.  There  is  no  real  con- 
nection between  7-13  and  14-29.  What  Herod  '  heard '  was  about 
Jesus  himself,  not  about  the  apostles.  He  heard  of  his  appearance 
at  Capernaum,  which  from  the  first  created  great  sensation,  and 
the  news  of  which  must  have  penetrated  to  Antipas  tolerably 
early.  Loisy  is  inclined,  however,  to  keep  the  ordinary  inter- 
pretation. The  apostles,  sent  by  Jesus,  attracted  attention  to 
their  Master.  Herod  Antipas  (the  son  of  Herod  the  Great)  was 
properly  not  the  '  king '  but  the  '  tetrarch  '  of  Galilee  and  Persea. 

There  are  two  readings,  'he  said'  and  'they  said.'  Loisy 
prefers  'he  said.'  W.,  on  the  contrary,  observes:  'Of  course  one 
Inust  read  "  they  said  " '  (i.e.  people  said). 

Though  not  absolutely  necessary,  it  is  probable  that  John 
must  have  been  supposed  to  have  worked  miracles  in  his  lifetime, 
or  the  conjecture  that  'miraculous  powers'  were  active  in  him 
after  his  death  would  hardly  have  been  thought  of.  It  is  note- 
worthy that  the  hjrpothesis  that  Jesus  is  really  John  resurrected 
implies  that '  le  grand  eclat  de  la  predication  galileenne  est  survenu 
seulement  aprfes  la  mort  du  Pr^curseur '  {E.  S.  i.  p.  918). 

15.  That  Jesus  was  a  prophet  like  the  old  prophets  seems  to 
have  hit  the  mark  most  nearly.  His  freshness  and  originality,  his 
power  and  confidence,  his  assurance  of  direct  divine  inspiration, 
are  all  points  of  resemblance  between  him  and  them.  Like  them, 
'  he  spoke  with  authority,  and  not  as  the  Scribes.'  It  is  important 
to  note  that  none  suppose  he  is  the  Messiah,  though  some  think  that 


VI.  30-44]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDING  TO  MARK  IS3 

he  is  Messiah's  precursor.  So  far,  then,  Jesus  could  have  made 
no  Messianic  pretensions ;  his  secret,  if  the  secret  had  yet  dawned 
upon  him,  had  not  been  discovered. 

1 6.  Herod  may  conceivably  have  really  said  this.  'II  a  pu 
reellement  dire,  parlant  en  homme  politique,  et  en  face  d'une 
nouvelle  agitation  messianique  h  comprimer,  Voila  Jean  ressuscit6 ! ' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  919). 

1 7-29.  Now  follows  a  sort  of  footnote  or  appendix,  explaining 
how  Herod  came  to  hold  the  view  he  did  about  Jesus,  and  how 
John  had  met  his  end.  The  story  of  John's  death  is  full  of 
historical  improbabilities,  and  may  be  regarded  as  legendary. 

Herodias  was  not  the  wife  of  Herod's  brother  Philip,  but  of 
another  brother,  also  called  Herod.  The  real  reason  of  Herod 
Antipas's  fear  of  John  is  indicated  in  Josephus  (Ant.  XVIII.  5.  2). 

18.     For  this  law,  cp.  Leviticus  xviii.  16,  xx.  21. 


30-44.    The  Eetuen  of  the  Apostles  and  the  Feeding 
OF- THE  Five  Thousand 

(Gp.  Matt.  xiv.  13-21 ;  Luke  ix.  10-17) 

30  And  the  apostles  gathered  themselves  together  unto  Jesus, 

31  and  told  him  all  that  they  had  done  and  taught.  And  he  said 
unto  them,  '  Come  ye  by  yourselves  into  a  lonely  place,  and  rest 
a  while.'     For  there  were  many  coming  and  going,  and  they  had 

32  no  leisure  so  much  as  to  eat.     And  they  went  away  by  boat  to 

33  a  lonely  place  by  themselves.  But  many  saw  them  departing, 
and  noticed  whither  they  were  going,  and  they  hurried  thither 

34  on  foot  from  all  the  cities,  and  arrived  before  them.  And  Jesus, 
when  he  disembarked,  saw  a  great  crowd,  and  he  was  moved  with 
compassion  toward  them,  because  they  were  as  sheep  without  a 
shepherd:  and  he  began  to  teach  them  many  things. 

35  And  when  the  day  was  now  far,  spent,  his  disciples  came  unto 
him,  and  said,  '  This  is  a  lonely  place,  and   the  hour  is  already 

36  late.  Send  the  people  away,  that  they  may  go  into  the  farms 
and  villages  round  about,  and  buy  themselves  something  to  eat.' 

37  But  he  answered  and  said  unto  them,  '  Give  ye  them  to  eat.' 
And  they  said  unto  him,  'Shall  we  go  and  buy  two  hundred 


154  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  30-44 

38  shillings  worth  of  bread,  and  give  them  to  eat  ? '    He  said  unto 
them,  '  How  many  loaves  have  ye  ?  go  and  see.'     And  when  they 

39  had  found  out,  they  said,  'Five,  and  two  fishes.'    And  he  bade 
them  make  them  all  sit  down  by  companies  upon  the  green  grass. 

4o>  41  And  they  sat  down  in  rows,  by  hundreds  and  by  fifties.  And  he 
took  the  five  loaves  and  the  two  fishes,  and  looked  up  to  heaven, 
and  said  the  blessing;  and  he  broke  the  loaves,  and  gave  them 
to  his  disciples  to  set  before  them ;  and  the  two  fishes  he  divided 

42,  43  among  them  all.  And  they  did  all  eat,  and  were  satisfied.  And 
they  took  of  the  broken  pieces  twelve  baskets  full,  and  also  of 
44  the  fishes.  And  they  that  ate  of  the  loaves  were  about  five 
thousand  men. 

The  apostles  return,  and  report  to  Jesus  their  experiences. 
But  there  seems  to  have  been  no  tradition  as  to  what  these  were. 
Mark,  at  least,  says  no  word  upon  the  subject.  It  would  also 
seem  as  if  the  story  of  the  five  thousand  had  at  first  nothing  to 
do  with  the  return  of  the  apostles,  and  that  the  journey  of  Jesus 
with  them  across  the  lake  (if  indeed  the  scene  of  the  feeding 
was  originally  placed  there)  was  not  primarily  motived  or  caused 
by  the  desire  to  give  them  a  rest  after  their  exhausting  labours. 
As  the  narrative  stands  now,  the  return  of  the  apostles  is  used 
as  a  transition  to  the  miracle  of  the  feeding.  But  'as  the 
scene  of  the  feeding  is  placed  on  the  other  side  of  the  lake,  "in 
a  desert  place,"  the  apostles  have  also  to  be  taken  across.  This 
is  strangely  done.  They  are  to  rest  after  their  tiring  journey, 
yet  because  of  the  pressing  crowd  they  cannot  rest  at  home,  but 
only  after  another  journey  into  the  desert.  Nevertheless  they 
get  no  rest  after  all.  For  the  "  crowd "  also  is  wanted,  and 
so  it  must  come  too.  The  people  go  round  the  lake,  as  if  they 
knew  the  situation  of  the  desert  place  quite  well,  and  they  arrive 
at  the  goal,  which  they  do  not  know,  by  a  detour  on  foot,  more 
quickly  than  Jesus,  going  straight  by  boat.  This  looks  like  aa 
artificially  made  connection '  (W.). 

34.  Note  again  the  pity  which  Jesus  feels  for  the  neglected 
'  multitude.'  It  is  also  characteristic  and  charming  that  he  is 
not  merely  anxious  to  look  after  their  souls.  He  thinks  of  their 
bodies  also  {cp.  v.  43,  viii.  2). 

The  miracle  may,  perhaps,  have  a  historical  basis.  Numbers 
soon  get  magnified  in  oral  tradition,  and  a  kindly  gift  of  food  is 
turned  into  a  miracle.     W.'s  note  is  as  follows : 

'  There  is  no  reason  to  regard  the  feeding  of  the  people  as 


VI.  30-44]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  ISS 

unhistorical.  Matthew  recounts  it  as  a  great  miracle.  But  the 
miracle  depends  on  the  numbers,  and  numbers  always  get  ex- 
aggerated in  oral  tradition.  Eliminate  these,  and  the  kindly 
picture  remains  of  a  fair  evening  and  a  lonely  spot  by  the  lake, 
with  a  crowd  lying  in  groups  upon  the  grass,  aad  the  disciples 
moving  among  them  and  distributing  bread  and  fish.  The  point 
of  the  story  is  that  Jesus  does  not  merely  dismiss  the  people  with 
sermons,  but  also  looks  after  the  needs  of  their  bodies,  convinced 
that  the  store  brought  for  him  and  his  disciples  will  also  suffice  for 
his  unbidden  guests.' 

Dr  Carpenter,  on  the  contrary,  thinks  that  '  the  interpretation 
of  the  story  as  a  materialisation  of  the  Teacher's  ministry  of  the 
word,  the  "  bread  of  life,"  through  the  confusion  of  a  symbol  with 
a  fact,  is  far  more  in  accordance  with  [then  existing]  modes  and 
tendencies  of  thought.  It  seems  more  probable,  however,  that 
the  narrative  is  due  to  the  blending  of  various  imaginative  im- 
pulses, in  which  suggestions  from  diififerent  sources,  working,  it 
may  be,  on  some  actual  reminiscence,  have  been  moulded  together 
into  one  whole.'  There  were  the  Old  Testament  counterparts — 
the  manna,  the  widow's  cruse :  above  all,  the  twenty  loaves  of 
barley  from  which  lOO  men  ate  and  '  left  thereof  Dr  Carpenter 
thinks,  however,  that  these  '  examples  needed  some  closer  con- 
nection with  the  actual  work  of  Jesus  to  have  much  real  share 
ID  calling  forth  a  corresponding  incident.'  He  finds  this  in  the 
story  of  the  last  supper  and  in  the  common  meal  which  in  the  early 
Church  preceded  the  celebration  of  the  eucharist.  Had  Jesus 
only  once  eaten  with  his  disciples  ?  '  Gradually  the  Church  con- 
ceived the  picture  of  its  own  usage  in  the  wilderness.  There  too 
the  brethren  had  heard  the  word.  There  too,  in  the  Teacher's 
presence,  they  had  "sat  down"  as  at  tables  in  orderly  array. 
There  too  had  been  brought  the  simple  gifts  of  bread  and  fish. 
There  too  the  blessing  or  thanksgiving  had  been  offered,  the  loaf 
broken,  the  food  carried  round'  (First  Three  Gospels, Tpp.  187-189). 
M.  Loisy  takes  very  much  the  same  line,  but  he  distinguishes 
between  Mark's  view  and  the  views  of  Matthew  and  Luke.  In 
Mark,  the  miracle  symbolizes  how  the  Christian  community  lives 
on  the  words  of  Jesus,  and  also  on  its  communion  with  him.  In 
Matthew  and  Luke  it  is  a  figure  of  the  community  united  together 
by  Jesus  in  the  common  love  feasts,  the  eucharistic  meal.  The 
twelve  baskets  originally  symbolized  the  idea  of  the  inexhaustibly 
fertile  "Word,  and  then,  to  the  Evangelists,  the  spiritual  benefits  of 
the  gospel,  of  which  the  apostles  (there  is  one  basket  for  each 
apostle)  are  the  depositaries.  Whether  any  incident,  no  longer 
ascertainable,  was,  together  with  the  O.T.  passages,  the  point  of 
departure  for  the  symbolic  tale,  as  we  have  it  now,  or  whether  it 


IS6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  30-44 

was  some  saying  of  Jesus  and  the  memory  of  the  common  meals 
at  which  he  presided,  cannot  be  made  out  (E.  S.  I.  pp.  936—938). 

Prof.  Pfleiderer  thinks  much  the  same,  but  with  a  difference. 
The  story,  he  believes,  is  partly  due  to  the  very  practical  question 
whether  meetings  of  the  early  believers  for  teaching  and  edification 
were  to  be  concluded  with  a  common  meal  paid  for  by  the  common 
purse.  Some  would  argue  that  the  funds  did  not  suffice  for  large 
gatherings.  '  Send  the  people  away,'  they  argued.  But  a  more 
compassionate  and  trusting  spirit  prevailed,  and  the  common  meals, 
which  also  reflected  the  habits  of  the  Master,  were  established. 
The  '  holy  communion '  in  the  restricted  sense  of  the  word  was 
originally  one  with  the  '  Liebesmahl'  of  the  community  (Ur- 
christentum,  Vol.  I.  p.  354). 

However  the  origin  of  the  story  be  accounted  for,  the  influence 
of  the  Elijah  and  Elisha  tales  must  have  been  very  great.  As 
usual,  Jesus  must  surpass  whatever  these  ancient  heroes  accom- 
plished. And  no  one  can  read  2  Kings  iv.  42-44  without  being 
convinced  that  at  least  the  major  portion  of  the  story  has  its  origin 
there.     The  parallelism  is  extremely  striking. 


45-56.    Jesus  walks  on  the  Lake 
(Cp.  Matt.  xiv.  22-36) 

45  And  straightway  he  made  his  disciples  get  into  the  boat,  and 
cross  over  to  the  other  side,  unto  Bethsaida,  while  he  dismissed 

46  the  people.    And  when  he  had  sent  them  away,  he  departed  unto 

47  the  mountain  to  pray.     And  when  evening  was  come,  the  boat 

48  was  in  the  middle  of  the  lake,  and  he  alone  on  the  land.  And  he 
saw  them  distressed  in  their  rowing;  for  the  wind  was  against 
them :  and  about  the  fourth  watch  of  the  night  he  came  up  to 
them,  walking  upon  the  lake,  and  he  meant  to  have  passed  by 

49  them.     But   when  they  saw  him  walking  upon    the  lake,  they 

50  supposed  it  was  a  ghost,  and  cried  out :  for  they  all  saw  him,  and 
were  troubled.     But  he  immediately  spoke   to  them,  and  said, 

51  '  Take  courage ;  it  is  I ;  be  not  afraid.'  And  he  went  up  to  them 
into  the  boat ;  and  the  wind  dropped.     Then  were  they  utterly 

52  beside  themselves  with  amazement,  for  they  had  not  understood 
about  the  loaves :  for  their  heart  was  hardened. 

53  And  when  they  had  crossed  over,  they  came  unto  Gennesaret, 

54  and  moored  the  boat  there.     And  when  they  got  out  of  the  boat, 


VI.  4S-S6]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 57 

55  straightway  the  people  recognized  him.  And  they  ran  through 
that  whole  region,  and  began  to  bring  those  that  were  sick  on  beds 

56  to  wherever  they  heard  that  he  was.  And  whithersoever  he 
entered,  into  villages,  or  cities,  or  farmyards,  they  laid  the  sick  in 
the  open  places,  and  besought  him  that  they  might  touch  if  it 
were  but  the  border  of  his  garment :  and  as  many  as  touched  him 
were  healed. 

'  Le  r^cit  de  la  premiere  multiplication  est  6troitement  lid  k 
celui  de  Jdsus  marchant  sur  les  eaux.  Marc  a  dii  trouver  les  deux 
rdunis  dans  la  tradition,  et  sans  doute  dans  une  redaction  qu'il 
complete  a  sa  maniere,  en  observant  que  les  apdtres  n'avaient  pas 
compris  ces  deux  miracles  symboliques '  (E.  S.  i.  p.  90).  But  the  story 
of  the  feeding,  like  that  of  the  temptation  and  the  transfigura- 
tion, does  not  belong,  according  to  Loisy,  to  the  first  edition  of  the 
sources,  but  was  added  in  a '  redaction  inter m  ediaire '  {E.  >Sf.  i.  p.  1 1 5 ). 

45.  There  is  some  geographical  difficulty  here.  It  seems 
implied  in  32  that  Jesus  had  crossed  over  to  the  other,  eastern, 
side  of  the  lake.  Perhaps  '  to  the  other  side "  has  been  wrongly 
added  on  here  from  Matt.  xiv.  22.  Bethsaida  lay  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Jordan,  on  the  north  side  of  the  lake.  It  was  not  in  Antipas's 
territory,  but  in  that  of  Philip,  who  enlarged  it  and  called  it 
Julias. 

What  was  the  need  of  haste  ?  Why  did  Jesus  compel  the 
disciples  to  leave  him  ?  That  they  might  get  to  Bethsaida  before 
night  ?  Could  he  not  have  dismissed  the  '  crowd '  in  their  presence 
and  gone  with  them  ?  Or  was  it  in  order  that  he  might  be  alone 
and  pray  in  solitude  ?  There  seems,  as  J.  Weiss  says,  something 
fragmentary  and  strange  about  the  narrative. 

The  miracle  seems  to  be  a  variant  of  iv.  35-41.  But  the 
marvel  is  heightened.  It  is  impossible  to  say  with  certainty  how 
the  legend  of  the  miracle  grew  up.  One  may  conjecture  that  the 
narrative  of  Mark  is  intended  to  have  various  spiritual  meanings 
and  foreshado wings.  'II  s'agit,'  says  Loisy,  'd'un  depart  et  d'un 
retour  du  Christ,  sous  lesquels  on  pent  entrevoir  le  grand  depart 
de  la  mort,  et  le  grand  retour  dans  la  gloire '  (E.  S.  I.  p.  941). 

Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  we  have  here  again  the  materialising 
of  symbols.  '  The  emblematic  language  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures 
was  constantly  in  the  hearts  and  upon  the  lips  of  the  Christian 
believer.'  We  know  how  often  the  metaphor  of  the  great  waters 
and  an  escape  from  them  meets  us  in  the  Hebrew  Bible.  The 
Christians  would  have  faith  even  amid  stormy  waters :  for  Christ 
could   save  them.     '  Out  of  some   such  utterance   of  trust  has 


IS8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  45-56 

probably  come  the  story  of  the  disciples  in  their  passage  across 
the  lake,  distressed  by  a  contrary  wind'  {First  Three  Gospels, 
pp.  179,  180). 

48.  They  started  rowing  in  the  late  afternoon.  When  did 
Jesus  see  them  in  their  distress  ?  And  how  could  he  see  them 
at  night  in  the  '  middle '  of  the  lake  from  the  mountain  ?  One 
must  not  ask  these  questions  of  a  legendary  narrative.  To  the 
narrator,  as  Loisy  says,  absorbed  in  the  deeper  meaning  of  the  tale, 
they  did  not  exist. 

Jesus  proceeds  to  walk  forth  upon  the  waters  of  the  lake,  and 
just  before  the  dawn  (the  fourth  watch)  he  overtakes  the  disciples. 
Why  did  he  intend  at  first  to  pass  in  front  of  them  and  not  to 
enter  the  boat  (a  detail  only  mentioned  by  Mark)  ?  Was  it  just 
to  show  himself  master  over  wind  and  water  ?  Holtzmaim  ap- 
parently accepts  this  explanation.  What  he  calls  a  Schauwunder 
is  performed.  Loisy  thinks  that  for  Jesus  to  intend  to  pass  the 
boat  merely  to  show  his  miraculous  powers  would  be  puerile,  if, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  miracle  itself,  some  deeper  meaning  were 
not  thereby  conveyed.  '  La  perspective  paralt  s'^tendre  du  cas 
present  k  celui  de  la  r&urrection ;  et  elle  va,  en  realite,  de  la  resur- 
rection au  dernier  av^nement '  (E.  S.  i.  p.  942).  The  conversation 
between  Jesus  and  the  disciples  recalls,  he  thinks,  the  stories  of  the 
resurrection.  But  if  this  be  so,  the  parallels  are  not  with  anything 
in  Mark.  They  are  with  Matt,  xxviii.  10  and  especially  with  Luke 
xxiv.  37-39. 

52.  Mark's  persistent  attribution  of  spiritual  blindness  to  the 
disciples  becomes  here  exceedingly  awkward.  The  greatness  of 
the  miracles  of  the  feeding  or  of  the  walking  upon  the  water 
could  not  have  escaped  their  notice.  What,  however,  he  perhaps 
wishes  to  indicate  is  that  the  '  mystery '  of  the  Kingdom,  though 
'  given  'to  the  disciples,  was  not  apprehended  by  them  till  after 
the  resurrection.  Tradition,  indeed,  told  of  some  definite  re- 
cognition of  Jesus  as  the  Messiah  at  Cassarea  Philippi,  but  the 
deeper  nature  of  the  Messiahship,  and  the  realization  that  its 
true  manifestation  was  only  to  come  after  Jesus's  death  and 
resurrection,  were  still  hidden  from  them.  The  'hardness'  of 
their  heart  was  as  divinely  wrought  as  Pharaoh's.  Or  we  may 
explain,  with  Loisy,  more  generally,  that  Mark  means  to  say  that 
the  deeper  meaning  of  the  miracles,  their  inner  and  spiritual 
signification,  were  at  first  unknown  to  those  who  were  nevertheless 
their  eye-witnesses.  They  did  not  (till  after  the  resurrection) 
understand  what  had  been  going  on  before  their  eyes. 

53.    Gennesaret  is  the  name  of  a  district,  not  a  town.     But  in 


VI.  45-56]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  159 

45  they  were  to  go  to  Bethsaida,  and  Bethsaida  did  not  belong  to 
Gennesaret.     Some  explain  that  they  were  driven  out  of  their 
course  by  the  wind  and  had  to  land  where  they  could.     Genne- 
saret was  south  of  Capernaum,  and  in  Galilee.     The  population 
is  delighted  to  have  Jesus  again  among  them,  and  desire  to  use 
the  precious  opportunity  for  all  that  it  is  worth.     Jesus  seems 
to  pass  from  place  to  place  without  stopping  anywhere.     He  is 
'  auf  unsteter  Wanderung,'  and  does  not  want  to  remain  in  Galilee. 
M.  Loisy  has  some  important  suggestions  upon  the  section 
53-56.    'Jesus  and  his  disciples  land  in  the  district  of  Gennesaret, 
between  Capernaum  and  Magdala.     The  formula  of  transition, 
"and  having  crossed  over"  appears  to  take  no  account  of  the 
preceding    narrative,  and  the    connection   of  this   notice   with 
the   miracle   of  Jesus  walking  upon  the  waters   may  possibly 
not  be   original.... It  may  be   supposed  that  in  the   oldest  re- 
daction of  the  Gospel  history  this  voyage  came  after  the  return 
of  the  apostles  (note  the  parallelism  of  32,  33  and  54,  55),  and 
that   the   district  of  Gennesaret  is  the   place  to  which   Jesus 
retired  at  first  with  them;    as  he  was  immediately  recognized 
and  fresh  crowds  rushed  to  follow  him,  he  went  away  altogether 
and  moved  towards  Tyre  and  Sidon.     The  argument  with  the 
Pharisees  about  the  washing  of  hands  is  an  insertion ;    it  did 
not  take  place  in  the  country  of  Gennesaret,  but  at  Capernaum, 
of  Jesus's   return  to  which  there  is,  however,  no  mention.     In 
the  same  way  it  is  possible  that   the   narratives  of  the  loaves 
and  the  walking  on  the  waters  have  been  inserted  between  the 
return  of  the  apostles  and  the  departure  for  Gennesaret.... It  is 
quite  evident  that  the  Saviour  had  not  come  to  Gennesaret  to 
preach  there,  that  he  had  believed  that  there  was  a  chance  that 
he  would  not  be  recognized ;  that  the  assembly  of  the  crowd  did 
not  induce  him  to  stop  there,  that  he  pursues  his  journey  as  if 
he  had  wished  finally  to  reach  a  place  where  he  and  his  disciples 
would  be  in  peace  and  safety....  We  are  reduced  to  conjectures 
about  the  motives  which  inspired  the  conduct  of  Jesus.     The 
desire  of  devoting  himself  to  his  disciples  is  an  insufficient  motive, 
considering  that  on  every  other  occasion  the  Saviour  had  not 
failed  to  encourage  the  faith  of  those  who  came  so  eagerly  to 
him.     It  may  be  surmised  that  he  feared  attracting  the  attention 
of  Herod  if  he  excited  the  enthusiasm  of  the  people  in  the  district 
near  Tiberias.     Perhaps  this  was  the  reason  why  he  had  not  yet 
gone  there,  although  the  district  was  not  far  from  Capernaum. 
Having  now  failed  to  pass  by  it  unnoticed,  as  he  had  hoped,  he 
judged  it  expedient  to  go  away  from  it  as  quickly  as  possible.    The 
name  of  Herod  will  occur  a  little  farther  on,  in  a  declaration  which 
suggests  that  the  attitude  of  the  tetrarch  towards  the  gospel 


l6o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VI.  45-56 

movement  was  rather  disquieting.  It  seems  clear  that  if  Jesus 
had  avowed  himself  the  Messiah  in  Galilee,  he  would  have  met 
in  his  own  country  the  fate  which  awaited  him  in  Jerusalem '  (E.  S. 
I.  pp.  946-948).  With  this  we  may  usefully  compare  W.'s  notes 
on  vi.  30-33  cited  above.  The  last  sentence  of  Loisy's  suggests 
much  food  for  thought.  Have  we  here  the  true  explanation  why 
Jesus  keeps  his  Messiahship  hidden  ?  It  is  not  exactly  because 
his  Messiahship  is  spiritual,  and  the  ordinary  Jewish  conception 
of  it  is  '  political,'  for  his  Messiahship  includes  and  implies  a  new 
world  and  the  downfall  of  the  Roman  power,  but  because  for  the 
present  the  powers  of  evil  are  too  potent.  The  moment  for  open 
declaration  and  for  '  come  what  may '  has  not  yet  arrived.  The 
dinouement  must  take  place  in  Jerusalem, 


CHAPTER  VII 

1-23.    The  Washing  of  Hands 

{Cp.  Matt.  XV.  1-20) 

1  And  the  Pharisees,  and  some  scribes  who  came  from  Jerusalem, 

2  gathered  round  him.     For  they  had  seen  some  of  his  disciples  eat 

3  bread  with  unclean,  that  is  to  say,  with  unwashed  hands.  For 
the  Pharisees,  and  all  the  Jews,  observing  the  tradition  of  the 

4  Elders,  do  not  eat  without  first  washing  their  f^nds.  And  when 
they  come  from  the  market,  till  they  have  washed,  they  eat  not. 
And  many  other  customs  there  are  which  they  have  received  and 
observe,  such  as  the  washing  of  cups  and  pots  and  brazen  vessels. 

5  So  the  Pharisees  and  scribes  asked  him,  '  Why  walk  not  thy 
disciples  according  to  the  tradition  of  the  elders,  but  eat  bread 

6  with  unclean  hands  ? '  He  said  unto  them,  '  Well  did  Isaiah 
prophesy    of    you    hypocrites,    as    it    is    written,    This    people 

7  honoureth  me  with  their  lips,  but  their  heart  is  far  from  me.  And 
vainly  do  they  worship  me,  teaching  as  their  doctrines  the  com- 

8  mandments  of  men.  So  ye,  neglecting  the  commandment  of 
God,  observe  the  tradition  of  men.' 

9  And  he  said  unto  them, '  Ye  do  well  to  reject  the  command- 

10  ment  of  God,  in  order  that  ye  may  keep  your  tradition!    For 
Moses   said,  Honour   thy  father   and   thy  mother;    and,  Whoso 

11  revileth  father  or  mother,  let  him  die  the  death:  but  ye — ^if  a 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  l6l 

man  say  to  his  father  or  mother,  That  by  which  thou  mightest 
have  been  benefited  from  me  is  Corban, — (that  is,  an  offering), — 

12  ye  no  longer  permit  him  to  do  anything  for  his  father  or  his 

13  mother.  Thus  ye  make  the  word  of  God  void  through  your 
tradition,  which  ye  hand  down ;  and  many  such  like  things  ye  do.' 

14  And  he  called  all  the  people  again  unto  him,  and  he  said  unto 

15  them,  '  Hearken,  all  of  you,  unto  me,  and  understand :  There  is 
nothing  outside  a  man,  which  entering  into  him  can  make  him 
unclean ;  but  the  things  which  come  out  of  a  man,  these  are 
what  make  him  unclean.' 

17  And  when  he  had  entered  into  the  house  away  from  the  crowd, 

18  his  disciples  asked  him  concerning  the  saying.  And  he  said  unto 
them,  'Are  ye,  too,  so  unintelligent?  Do  ye  not  perceive  that 
whatever  entereth  into  a  man  from  without  cannot  make  him 

19  unclean?  For  it  entereth  not  into  his  heart,  but  into  the  belly, 
and  goeth  out  into  the  privy.'     [Thus  spake  he,  making  all  foods 

20  clean.]     And  he  said,  '  That  which  cometh  out  of  the  man,  that 

21  maketh  the  man  unclean.  For  from  within,  out  of  the  heart 
of  men,   come    the    evil    thoughts — unchastity,    thefts,    murders, 

'  22  adulteries,  covetousness,  wickedness,  deceit,  lasciviousness,  envy, 
33  blasphemy,  pride,  foolishness :  all  these  evil  things  come  out  from 

within,  and  they  make  a  man  unclean.' 

\ 

It  has  been  already  said  at  the  close  of  the  last  chapter  that 
this  scene  with  the  Pharisees  has  been  here  interpolated.  Its 
locale  is  probably  Capernaum,  and  it  may  have  taken  place  at  the 
close  of  the  Galilsean  ministry.  Perhaps  it  has  been  placed  here, 
as  M.  Loisy  says,  as  a  suitable  preliminary  to  the  journey  of  Jesus 
on  to  pagan  soil,  and  perhaps  also  there  was  a  desire  to  show  the 
facilities  offered  by  Christianity  to  the  conversion  of  the  Gentiles. 

The  section  is  of  profound  significance  and  value ;  it  raises 
questions  of  the  deepest  importance.  As  regards  its  compilation 
it  is  clearly  composite,  as  the  various  fresh  beginnings  and 
resumptions  (9,  14,  17,  20)  sufficiently  indicate.  The  saying  in 
15  is  the  main  basis  for  the  whole.  It  is  traditional  and 
authentic.  Was  it  found  in  Q  and  did  Mark  take  it  thence  ?  So 
thinks  Loisy,  who  would  also  add  for  the  same  source  5  and  9-13. 

2.  For  the  laws  of  the  Rabbis  dealing  with  ablutions,  and 
especially  with  washing  the  hands  before   meals  and  with  the 

M.  " 


l62  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

cleansing  of  dishes,  see  Additional  Note   10.     The  accuracy  of 
Mark's  editorial  explanations  is  there  discussed. 

3  and  4  are  an  editorial  parenthesis.  The  main  sentence  is 
resumed  (with  irregular  construction)  in  5- 

3.  TTVKvd,  Revised  Version,  'diligently';  Holtzmann,  'often.' 
Another  reading  is  irvyfiy,  '  with  the  fist,'  which  some  explain  to 
mean  'carefully,'  'vigorously.' 

77  irapdZocTit;  t(Sv  Trpetr^vreprnv,  '  the  tradition  of  the  Elders.' 
The  phrase  is  sufficiently  explained  by  reference  to  Josephus 
{Ant.  XIII.  10.  6)  and  to  Swete's  note.  The  '  Oral  Law,'  codified 
later  on  in  the  Mishnah,  was  then  in  its  formative  period. 

6.  In  his  reply  Jesus  takes  a  double  line.  The  first  is  that 
this  human  tradition,  which  he  is  blamed  for  disobeying,  has 
become  the  means  whereby  his  questioners  have  transgressed  the 
commands  of  God.  The  observance  of  these  ritual  enactments  has 
led  to  the  neglect  of  the  moral  laws  of  God.  Hence  (it  is  implied) 
it  is  surely  not  unreasonable  that  Jesus  should  disregard  this 
human  tradition.  The  second  line  of  reply  relates  to  the  act  itself 
of  which  the  disciples  are  accused.  This  second  'line  of  reply' 
does  not  come  till  14.  The  first  line  is  contained  in  a  double 
form,  6-8  and  9-13.  For  both  these  two  short  sections  deal  with 
the  relation  of  the  '  tradition '  to  the  '  commandment  of  God.'  It 
is  implied  in  the  one  section,  and  asserted  in  the  other,  that  through 
the  observance  of  the  '  tradition '  the  '  commandment  of  God '  is 
annulled  or  violated.  These  two  sections  are  thus  independent  of 
each  other.  They  are  parallels.  (It  may  also  be  observed  that 
the  quotation  in  7  is  based  upon  the  Septuagint.  The  Hebrew 
text  does  not  give  the  desired  meaning  and  opposition.  Hence 
we  may,  with  J.  Weiss  and  Loisy,  infer  that  Jesus  did  not  upon 
this  occasion  quote  Isaiah.  But  as  it  is  not  precisely  the  Septua- 
gint which  is  quoted,  Klostermann  argues  that  one  cannot  safely 
assert  that  only  a  reader  of  the  Septuagint  and  not  Jesus  could 
have  quoted  the  saying.)  In  the  phrase  'And  he  said  unto  them,' 
repeated  in  6  and  9,  we  may  discern  the  joints  of  a  composite 
speech.  Both  6-8  and  9-13  quote  a  sentence  from  Scripture  to 
prove  the  same  thesis. 

Yet  6-8,  by  itself,  is  not  strictly  any  proof  whatever  that  the 
observance  of  the  tradition  causes  the  violation  of  the  Law.  It  is 
a  mere  assertion,  which  assumes  what  has  to  be  proved.  The 
'  commandment '  which  is  violated  for  the  sake  of  observing  the 
tradition  is,  I  presume,  the  general  and  fundamental  command- 
ment that  God  is  to  be  honoured  from  the  '  heart ' — loved  with  all 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDINQ  TO  MARK  163 

thy  heart,  as  it  says  in  Deuteronomy.  If,  then,  the  Pharisees 
who  observe  the  tradition  are  the  people  of  whom  Isaiah  speaks, 
they  do  violate  the  Law.  Nevertheless  it  is  not  proved  that  the 
'  observance '  causes  the  violation.  Hence  it  may  be  argued  either 
that  6-8  is  a  mere  introduction  to  the  proof  given  in  9-13  (so 
Matthew  treats  the  passage),  or  that  9-13  was  added  to  cover 
the  weakness  of  argument  in  6-8.  It  must  be  admitted  that 
Matthew's  order  of  the  reply  is  more  logical  and  cogent,  but  this 
is  not  necessarily  due  to  his  being  more  original.  Still  it  may 
perhaps  be  that  the  answer  which  Jesus  actually  made  was 
similar  to  that  which  we  now  read  in  Matt.  xv.  3-6  and  in 
Mark  vii.  9-13. 

Note  that  'the  tradition  of  the  Elders'  is  called  in  8  'the 
tradition  of  men,'  in  9  and  13  'your  tradition.'  It  would  seem 
that  Jesus  did  really  take  up  a  position  (despite  Matt,  xxiii.  3) 
of  definite  antagonism  to  the  ominously  increasiug  Oral  Law.  Does 
he,  then,  oppose  tradition,  which  is  merely  '  human,'  to  the  Pen- 
tateuchal  law,  which  is '  divine'?  The  commandment  of  God  which 
is  violated  by  the  tradition  is  a  law  of  the  Pentateuch.  But  it  is 
not  merely  a  Pentateuchal  law;  it  is  an  injunction  of  the  Decalogue. 
It  is  conceivable  that  Jesus  would  have  unhesitatingly  recognized 
the  divine  authority  of  the  Decalogue,  and  yet  have  had  his 
doubts  about  the  divine  and  binding  character  of  the  Pentateuchal 
legislation  as  a  whole.  And  it  may,  indeed,  be  argued  that  in  this 
very  section  Jesus  virtually  abi-ogates  a  most  definite  and  elaborate 
Pentateuchal  law.  But  he  does  not,  as  we  shall  see,  do  this  directly, 
and  it  may  even  be  that  the  full  consequence  of  the  great  principle 
laid  down  in  15  was  not  present  to  his  own  mind,  or  that  he  did 
not  desire  that  his  disciples  should  practically  draw  out  those 
consequences  in  their  own  lives.  It  cannot  be  assumed  ofifhand 
that  Jesus  himself  transgressed  the  dietary  laws  of  Leviticus  and 
Deuteronomy,  or  even  that  he  would  have  approved  of  his  disciples 
transgressing  them.  Such  deductions  must  remain  uncertain,  one 
way  or  the  other.  Dr  Carpenter,  however,  thinks  that  '  1 5  cuts 
athwart  the  whole  scheme  of  dietary  laws;  and  this  principle, 
together  with  that  of  man's  lordship  over  the  Sabbath,  seems  to 
me  to  amount  to  a  complete  breach  with  the  Law  on  its  ritual  and 
institutional  side.'  Gould  agrees : '  What  Jesus  says  abrogates  the 
distinction  between  clean  and  unclean,  which  forms  so  essential  a 
part  not  only  of  tradition,  but  also  of  the  Levitical  part  of  the 
Law  itself.' 

9.  KaKw<!  is  usually  here  taken  in  an  ironical  sense  to  mean 
*  excellently,'  '  thoroughly.'  W.  translates  interrogatively, '  Do  ye 
well  that  ye,'  &c. 

II — 2 


l64  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIL  1-33 

II,  12.  The  translation  of  the  Revised  Version  is  correct.  It 
preserves  the  broken  construction  of  the  Greek.  The  construction 
would  be  mended  if  with  W.  \e7eTe  be  omitted :  '  But  ye,  if  a 
man,'  &c.,  '  no  longer  suffer  him,'  &c. 

'  Corban '  is  literally  '  sacrifice ' ;  here  it  means  the  oath  used 
on  the  occasion  of  a  particular  kind  of  vow. 

'  Ye  no  longer  suffer  him  to  do  aught ' :  he  is  not  allowed  to 
benefit  his  parents.  The  words  are  ironical.  The  meaning  is: 
'  he  need  no  longer  benefit  them';  he  need  no  longer,  he  even  may 
not  any  longer,  use  that  which  is  now  '  Corban '  for  the  benefit  of 
his  parents. 

The  passage  is  very  difficult.  It  is  difficult,  (a)  because  the 
rule  which  Jesus  here  attributes  to  tradition  is  in  flat  contradiction 
to  the  law  as  laid  down  by  the  Mishnah,  as  commented  on  by  the 
Talmud,  and  as  universally  accepted  and  interpreted  by  all  the 
Jewish  codifiers ;  (6)  because  the  assertion  that  the  Pharisees 
violated  the  Law  of  God  in  order  to  maintain,  or  in  maintaining, 
their  own  rules  is  not  proved  by  the  instance  quoted.  On  the 
contrary,  the  instance  fails  just  at  the  crucial  point. 

First  of  all,  what  is  the  usual  interpretation  of  the  passage  ? 
It  is  that  the  son,  in  order  to  annoy  his  father,  dedicated  or  vowed 
for  the  use  of  the  Temple  a  given  part  of  his  property.  That  part 
is,  therefore,  interdicted  from  his  father,  who  may  not  benefit  from 
it,  or  use  it.  If  the  son  repent,  he  may  nevertheless  not  let  his 
father  profit  from,  or  use,  the  property  thus  vowed.  The  Scribes 
will  not  let  him  off  his  vow.  It  is,  I  presume,  implied  that  the 
Scribes  and  the  priests  were  in  collusion,  and  because  of  the 
advantage  which  accrued  to  the  Temple,  they  refused  to  annul 
the  vow.  '  The  Rabbis,'  says  Mr  Menzies,  for  instance,  '  decided 
that  the  duty  to  the  Temple  must  take  precedence  of  that  to 
parents.'  Mr  Hart  calls  this  explanation  of  our  passage  'a  striking 
example  of  the  exegesis  which  is  dominated  and  directed  by 
religious  prejudice.'     Anyway,  it  is  inaccurate. 

To  begin  with,  'Corban'  does  not  mean  that  the  property  was 
dedicated  to  the  use  of  the  Temple.  The  word  is  used  as  a  mere 
oath.  When  I  say  'Corban,  if  you  shall  ever  eat  anything  that  is 
mine,'  this  does  not  mean  that  my  eatables  are  dedicated  to  the 
use  of  the  Temple,  in  which  case  neither  I  nor  you  might  eat  them, 
but  merely  that,  so  far  as  you  are  concerned,  they  are  'dedicated'; 
you  may  never  eat  what  is  mine.  I  should  sin  in  letting  you  eat 
any  of  my  food,  so  long  as  the  vow  stands,  and  you,  if  you  ate, 
would  sin  also.    The  Temple  does  not  come  in. 

With  this  limitation,  however,  the  usual  interpretation  might 
conceivably  be  right.  In  a  fit  of  passion  I  vow,  with  the  oath  and 
formula  of  Corban,  that  my  father  is  never  to  eat  at  my  table,  or 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  l6S 

to  receive  any  of  my  property.  I  then  want  to  be  absolved  from 
my  vow.  The  Scribes  will  not  let  me.  They  gain  no  profit,  and 
the  Temple  gets  no  profit  one  way  or  the  other.  But  they  say :  as 
you  have  made  the  vow,  you  must  abide  by  it. 

Now  if  Jesus  had  said  that  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees  maintain 
what  is  less  important  and  neglect  what  is  more  important ;  that 
they  are  anxious  to  observe  the  sanctity  of  vows,  but  in  doing  so, 
they  are  willing  to  let  the  more  sacred  duty  of  the  fifth  command- 
ment go  to  the  wall,  the  passage  would,  so  far,  be  intelligible.  But 
how  can  it  be  regarded  as  a  case  of  Scripture  versus  tradition  ? 
Where  does  it  say  in  the  Pentateuch,  where  does  'Moses'  say, 
that  vows  which  conflict  with  a  more  important  demand  may  and 
should  be  annulled?  Nowhere  does  it  say  so.  The  annulling, 
not  the  maintenance  of  vows,  was  the  work  of  tradition.  It  is  to 
the  Pharisaic  tradition  that  are  owing  all  the  elaborate  rules  for 
annulling  vows,  and  by  a  curious  irony  of  fate  the  Pharisees  have 
been  constantly  assailed  just  on  the  ground  that  they  so  readily 
allowed  dispensation  of  vows.  Hence  the  illustration  does  not  seem 
to  fit  the  thesis.  The  particular  instance  is  not  a  case  where  the 
word  of  God  is  abrogated  by  tradition.  Deut.  xxiii.  21-23  speaks 
of  fulfilling  vows,  not  of  their  annulment.  So  too  Leviticus  xxx., 
where  the  only  exceptions  are  certain  vows  of  certain  women. 
Otherwise:  'When  a  man  voweth  a  vow  unto  the  Lord,  or  sweareth 
an  oath  to  bind  his  soul  with  a  bond,  he  shall  not  break  his  word; 
he  shall  do  according  to  all  that  proceedeth  out  of  his  mouth' 
(Numbers  xxx.  2).  Hence,  one  could  attack  the  Scribes,  perhaps, 
for  not  abrogating  one  'word  of  God'  in  favour  of  a  more  important 
'word  of  God,'  but  certainly  not  for  abrogating  the  word  of  God  in 
favour  of  tradition.  The  only  possible  explanation  would  be  to 
suppose  that  Jesus  forgot  that  a  '  word  of  God '  and  '  a  law  of 
Moses '  were  as  much  in  question  on  one  side  as  on  the  other,  and 
that,  in  his  moral  enthusiasm,  he  regarded  the  decision  of  the 
Scribes  that  the  vow  could  not  be  annulled,  even  though  the 
parent  suffered,  as  Scribe  law  and  not  Mosaic  Law,  human  law 
and  not  divine  Law. 

But  the  difficulties  of  the  passage  are  not  yet  over.  For  the 
odd  thing  is  that  according  to  the  Rabbinic  law  as  codified  in  the 
Mishnah,  and  commented  on  in  the  Talmud,  the  Rabbis  are  on 
the  side  of  Jesus,  and  take  his  very  line.  Even  Schiirer,  whose 
interpretation  of  the  Mishnah  is  inaccurate  on  the  whole,  admits 
that  'so  far  the  practice  blamed  by  Jesus  goes  further  than  the 
law  as  codified  in  the  Mishnah '  {Geschichte  des  judischen  Volkes 
im  Zeitalter  Jem  Ghristi,  3rd  ed.  Vol.  11.  p.  494,  n.  108).  That  is 
to  say,  if  a  man  make  a  vow  from  which  his  parents  would  suflFer, 
then  the  vow  can  be  annulled.    The  passage  in  the  Mishnah  is 


I66  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

clear,  though  it  has  been  frequently  misunderstood  by  Christian 
commentators.  Yet  the  Talmud  and  all  the  Jewish  mediaeval 
commentators  are  in  no  doubt  as  to  its  meaning.  It  occurs  in 
Nedarim  viii.  i :  '  Rabbi  EHezer  said,  The  door  is  opened  for 
a  man  on  account  of  the  honour  of  father  and  mother.  But 
the  Chachamim  (literally  wise  men,  the  majority  of  the  Rabbis) 
forbid  it.'  These  words  mean :  Suppose  a  man  has  made  a 
foolish  vow  (in  general,  from  which  his  father  does  not  materially 
suffer).  If  he  reflects  :  What  disgrace  I  bring  upon  my  father 
by  this  foolish  vow,  or  if  it  is  said  to  him,  would  you  have  made 
this  vow  had  you  reflected  that  people  would  say  to  your  father 
'What  a  son  is  yours;  what  hasty  vows  he  makes';  then  these 
arguments  are  not  enough  to  cancel  the  vow.  It  cannot  be 
annulled.  He,  and  even  his  parents,  must  bear  the  consequences 
of  his  rash  action.  That  this  interpretation  is  correct  seems 
certain  by  what  follows.  '  Nevertheless,  where  the  vow  has  to 
do  with  his  father  or  his  mother,  there  the  Rabbis  agree  with 
Rabbi  Eliezer  that  the  door  is  opened  to  him  on  account  of  the 
honour  of  father  and  mother.'  Precisely,  therefore,  where  parents 
would  suffer  from  the  vow,  would  and  could  the  vow  be  annulled. 
Thus  we  have  the  further  difSculty  that  Jesus  and  the  Rabbis  do 
not  here  differ ;  they  agree.  One  can  only  get  out  of  the  difficulty 
by  assuming  that  Jesus  came  in  contact  with  some  Rabbis  who 
held  that,  even  when  the  Law  directly  affected  the  parents,  it 
must  nevertheless  be  upheld,  and  that  even  here  it  could  not  be 
annulled.  For  this  view  Mr  Abrahams  tells  me  that  there  is  no 
direct  evidence,  but  it  is  not  at  all  improbable  that  so  vast  an 
innovation  as  the  annulment  of  vows  met  with  opposition  at  first. 
We  should  thus  have  here  an  instance,  not  of  a  general  antagonism 
between  Jesus  and  the  Pharisaic  law,  but  of  the  participation  of 
Jesus  in  the  discussion  of  the  application  of  the  law  to  Ufe. 
Sometimes  the  Rabbinic  opinion  finally  formed  itself  (as  here)  on 
the  side  which  Jesus  approved ;  sometimes  it  took  a  turn  in  a 
direction  different  from  the  opinion  of  Jesus.  In  any  case  the 
passage  cannot  be  used  to  prove  the  dangers  and  moral  evils  of 
legalism.  It  cannot  be  proved  to  show  that  the  honid  Rabbis 
taught  that  by  a  convenient  vow  a  man  might  easily  find  a  way 
of  disobeying  the  fifth  commandment.  The  truth  is  that  the 
Rabbis  taught  a  tremendous  respect  and  reverence  for  parents. 
In  this  matter  they  are  perfectly  sound ;  indeed  on  family  rela- 
tions they  are  keener  than  Jesus. 

For  a  different  view  of  the  whole  passage  see  Mr  Hart's 
intensely  interesting  article  '  Corban,'  Jewish  Quarterly  Review, 
Vol.  XIX.  pp.  615-650. 

13.     trapeScoKare.    This  tense  is  odd.    As  W.  says,  one  expects 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  167 

either  'which  ye  hand  on'  (irapaSCBoTe)  or  irapeXd^ere,  'which  ye 
have  received.' 

'Many  other  such  things  ye  do.'  Jesus  mentions  no  other, 
and  even  the  Christian  commentators  do  not,  so  far  as  I  know, 
supply  the  deficiency. 

14.  Jesus  now  turns  to  the  people,  having  dealt  with  and 
disposed  of  the  Scrihes,  and  proceeds  to  give  the  true  explanation 
and  justification  of  the  conduct  of  his  disciples.  He  lays  down  a 
moral  principle  of  great  depth  and  beauty,  but  to  the  plain  man 
neither  complicated  nor  obscure.  He  bids  the  people  understand 
it,  and  he  must  have  wished  them  to  understand.  We  may 
suppose  that,  if  the  whole  story  has  a  historic  basis,  Jesus 
enunciated  the  principle  to  all  his  listeners,  and  at  the  same  time 
added  such  illustration  and  elucidation  as  might  be  necessary. 
But  Mark,  true  to  his  theory,  assumes  that  the  principle  was  not 
even  understood  by  the  disciples,  and  required  to  be  specially 
explained  to  them.  Moreover,  he  calls  the  principle  a  parable, 
a  dark  saying,  though  it  can  scarcely  be  so  regarded.  The  Hebrew 
mashal,  however,  means  not  only  parable,  but  also  adage,  proverb, 
&c.,  and  perhaps  parable  is  used  in  a  similar  extended  sense  in 
this  passage.     See  note  on  iv.  i. 

Jesus  calls  the  people  'again.'  They  had  not  been  present  or 
summoned  before.  The  '  agaiu,'  says  M.  Loisy,  seems  to  refer  to 
similar  situations,  and  especially  to  the  scene  when  the  parables 
were  delivered  (iv.  i).  There  too  we  find  an  'again.'  It  is  a 
further  indication  that  the  section  has  undergone  touching  up, 
and  that  the  mise-en-scene  has  been  superadded  to  the  dialogue. 
The  primitive  elements  probably  are  the  criticism  of  the  Pharisees, 
the  statement  as  to  the  violation  of  the  Decalogue,  and  the  declara- 
tion as  to  defilement. 

M.  Loisy  also  holds  that  '  la  forme  un  peu  6nigmatique '  of  the 
declaration  was  the  reason  why  it  was  regarded  as  a  parable  which 
the  auditors  could  not  have  understood  and  which  needed  a  com- 
mentary. As  in  the  case  of  the  explanation  of  the  sower,  so  here. 
The  explanation  (17-23)  is  not  the  work  of  Jesus,  but  of  the 
community. 

15.  For  the  Rabbinic  conceptions  and  laws  of  clean  and 
unclean  and  their  application  in  everyday  life,  see  Additional 
Note  10. 

As  was  said  in  the  note  on  verse  14,  it  is  hard  to  suppose 
that  what  Jesus  says  here  is  a  parable,  i.e.  that  there  is  some 
spiritual  truth  over  and  above  the  words  themselves  which  the 
words  imply  or  refer  to.     In  that  case  the  commentary  (17-23) 


168  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

would  have  to  say  somethiug  different  from  the  declaration,  whereas 
it  seems  to  say  the  same  thing  in  other  terms.  The  only  way  in 
which  IS  can  be  interpreted  as  a  parable  in  a  strict  sense  would 
be  to  assume  that  its  meaning  is  that,  even  according  to  the  Law, 
a  man  is  defiled,  not  by  what  enters  him,  but  by  what  goes  out 
from  him,  i.e.  by  morbid  issues,  by  leprosy,  eruptions  and  so  on. 
Then  the  spiritual  interpretation  or  application  would  follow  in 
17-23.  But  this  explanation  is  unlikely,  first  because  to  press 
legal  points  of  this  kind  does  not  seem  in  Jesus's  manner,  secondly 
because  of  the  difiiculty  as  to  forbidden  food,  which  if  eaten,  does 
enter  into  the  man  and  does  make  him  unclean.  It  is  inadequate 
to  say  that  the  foods  which  the  Law  forbids  are  not  thought  of  or 
referred  to,  because  to  eat  them  is  a  deliberate  sin.  M.  Loisy  is 
right  in  urging  that  not  only  is  the  whole  explanation  too  '  subtle,' 
but  the  exception  which  has  to  be  made  as  to  forbidden  foods 
renders  the  explanation  altogether  too  thin  :  '  By  what  enters 
into  the  man  the  hearers  could  understand  nothing  but  food, 
and  as  the  debate  had  reference  to  the  question  of  purity  or 
impurity,  the  idea  of  impure  food  could  not  be  absent  from  their 
minds  nor  from  the  thought  of  Jesus ;  within  the  limits  of  the 
Law,  it  is  literally  false  to  say  that  man  cannot  be  polluted  by 
what  he  eats '  {E.  S.  I.  p.  959). 

Nevertheless  a  certain  diflSculty  remains,  over  and  above  the 
mere  fact  that  the  declaration  is  called  a  parable.  It  is  this :  the 
first  part  of  the  declaration  seems  to  speak  of  what  is  material ;  in 
the  second  it  would  speak  of  what  is  spiritual.  '  The  things  which 
go  in,'  go  in  literally  ;  '  the  things  which  go  out,'  go  out  meta- 
phorically. Words  and  thoughts,  and  the  sins  of  the  heart,  do  not 
'  go  out '  of  a  man  in  the  same  sense  as  food  "  goes  in.'  Yet  this 
irregularity  is  after  all  not  very  awkward,  and  gives  far  the  best 
sense.  M.  Loisy  indeed  suggests  one  other  alternative  explanation, 
but  it  seems  to  me  so  very  odd  and  unlikely  that  I  refrain  from 
quoting  it.     It  will  be  found  in  E.  S.  i.  p.  960. 

The  principle  which  Jesus  lays  down  is  that  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  religious  impurity  in  a  material  sense.  Religious  impurity 
can  only  exist  within  the  moral  and  spiritual  sphere.  A  man 
cannot  be  religiously  defiled  except  by  an  offence  committed  in 
the  sphere  of  religion.  Now  to  Jesus  the  sphere  of  religion  was 
the  inward  realm  of  the  spirit.  Inward  defilement,  the  defilement 
of  the  heart  by  the  sins  of  the  heart,  is  the  only  possible  reUgious 
defilement. 

Only  that  which  goes  out  of  a  man  can  defile  a  man,  that  is, 
make  him  religiously  unclean.  There  can  be  little  doubt  that 
Matt.  XV.  1 1  interprets  the  principle  fairly  correctly.  What 
goes  into  the  man  from  without  cannot  defile  him  religiously. 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  169 

'  Going  into '  refers  to  the  mouth,  and  '  going  out  of  has  the  same 
main  reference,  though  it  does  not  exclusively  refer  to  the  mouth, 
for  a  man's  deeds  as  well  as  his  words  are  alluded  to.  What  comes 
out  of  the  mouth  comes  from  the  heart,  and  the  heart  is  the  seat 
of  religious  uncleanness  as  it  is  the  seat  of  religious  purity.  Things 
cannot  be  religiously  either  clean  or  unclean ;  only  persons.  And 
'persons  cannot  be  defiled  by  tilings;  they  can  only  be  defiled 
by  themselves,  by  acting  irreligiously.  Or  the  principle  may  be 
worded  thus :  '  Spiritual  things  can  defile  the  man,  and  these 
only,  not  such  material  articles  as  food.  And  of  course  this  means 
that  the  real  man  is  the  spiritual  part,  and  that  defilement  of  the 
physical  part  does  not  extend  to  the  spiritual  part,  which  con- 
stitutes the  real  man.  That  can  only  be  reached  by  spiritual 
things  akin  to  itself.  The  principle  that  spiritual  and  spiritual  go 
together,  and  that  the  material  cannot  penetrate  the  spiritual, 
which  is  impervious  to  it,  is  needed  in  the  interpretation  of 
Christianity  as  well  as  in  the  reform  of  Judaism'  (Gould).  In 
voluntary  action,  however,  the  physical  act  may  be  spiritualised. 
If  this  be  not  allowed,  Gould's  words  go  too  far.  A  voluntary 
sexual  defilement  is  physical  and  yet  also  spiritual;  but  an  in- 
voluntary defilement  is  physical  only. 

So  far  as  the  principle  uttered  by  Jesus  can  be  applied  to  the 
particular  subject  in  dispute,  we  must,  I  suppose,  assume  that  the 
connection  is  this.  In  the  process  of  eating,  the  hand  touches  the 
food  to  be  eaten  and  then  touches  the  mouth.  (In  ancient  times, 
before  knives  and  forks  and  spoons  were  in  common  use,  the  hand 
touched  the  food  and  the  mouth  much  more  than  now.)  If,  then, 
the  hand  is  not  washed  before  food,  some  impurity,  some  particle 
of  an  unclean  object,  may  be  conveyed  to  the  mouth  and  thus 
render  the  eater  unclean. 

More  probably,  however,  we  have  to  assume  that  the  section 
beginning  with  verse  14  is  only  loosely  connected  with  what 
precedes,  and  deals  directly  with  the  question  of  forbidden  or 
'unclean'  foods,  and  with  the  true  and  false  conception  of  cleanness 
and  uncleanness.  For  this  question,  as  J.  Weiss  points  out,  was 
of  far  greater  importance  to  Mark's  readers  than  the  washing  of 
hands.  Had  the  Gentile  Christian  to  observe  the  Jewish  dietary 
laws  ?  Had  he  to  keep  himself  apart  from  eating  with  unbelievers  ? 
We  know  how  pressing  and  urgent  this  question  became.  Mark 
can  report  that  there  was  a  great  saying  of  the  Master's  which 
gave  all  Christians  the  right  liberty  in  these  outward  matters. 
He  finds  a  convenient  place  to  quote  it  here  where  another 
question  concerning  outward  purity  had  just  been  dealt  with. 

Another  view  is  that  Jesus  deliberately,  and  in  accordance 
with  his  usual  manner,  gave  no  direct  answer  to  the  question 


170  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

asked  him.  He  answers  it  indirectly,  first  by  throwing  cold  water 
upon  the  authority  and  value  of  that  tradition  which  he  is  blamed 
for  disregarding,  and  then,  secondly,  by  laying  down  a  much  wider 
general  principle  as  to  the  relation  of  the  outward  to  the  inward 
in  true  morality. 

It  must  be  noted  that  the  discussion  has  nothing  to  do  with 
cleanliness,  nor  can  we  properly  defend  the  ancient  ritualistic 
practice  by  saying  that  it  is  dirty  to  eat  with  unwashed  hands, 
that  cleanliness  is  next  to  godliness,  and  so  on.  That  is  not  the 
issue  involved.  Ritual  washing  might  be  in  fact  a  very  per- 
functory cleansing,  and  often  is  so  to-day.  The  question  is  one  of 
religious  defilement.  It  is  the  same  question  which  is  at  the 
root  of  all  the  dietary  laws.  Eating  a  rabbit  defiles  you  and 
makes  you  unclean.  Eating  a  chicken  (if  a  properly  killed  chicken) 
does  not.  According  to  the  principle  laid  down  by  Jesus,  no  thing 
can  make  you  unclean.    You  can  only  make  yourself  unclean  by  sin. 

The  principle  seems  profoundly  true.  It  destroys  with  a 
prophet's  blow  the  terrible  incubus  from  which  all  ancient 
religions  suffered,  that  certain  objects  or  physical  states  are  in 
themselves  taboo  or  religiously  unclean.  Doubtless  our  modem 
conceptions  of  clean  and  dirty  may  have  had  a  religious  origin ; 
doubtless,  too,  there  is  a  certain  moral  duty  in  physical  cleanli- 
ness, a  certain  inter-connection  between  the  material  and  the 
spiritual.  But  this  is  a  totally  different  thing  from  the  theory 
of  religious  uncleanness.  That  rested  upon  very  ancient  super- 
stitions, which,  again,  themselves  depended  upon  polytheistic  or 
'  animistic  '  conceptions  of  still  greater  antiquity.  Bitual  religion 
(which  made  up  a  considerable  part  of  priestly  religion)  was 
largely  concerned  with  practices  which  turned  upon,  or  were 
developed  out  of,  these  superstitious  conceptions.  The  reason 
why  dead  bodies,  or  a  woman  at  certain  moments  in  her  life, 
were  in  themselves  '  unclean,'  or  produced  religious  uncleanness, 
was  not  because  they  were  dirty.  It  was  because  the  dead  body 
and  the  woman  were  the  seat,  or  belonged  to  the  province,  of 
certain  hostile  or  dangerous  spirits.  It  is  these  ideas  which  are 
also  at  the  root  of  the  dietary  laws.  Religious  uncleanness  either 
means  being  connected  with  alien,  hostile,  or  dangerous  spirits 
and  influences,  or,  secondly,  it  means  being  in  a  condition  to  which 
your  god  objects,  and  when  it  is,  therefore,  dangerous  to  approach 
him.  And  this  condition  is  physical,  and  itself  probably  related 
to  the  former  cause  of  uncleanness.  In  any  case  the  god  is 
regarded  as  moved  to  pleasure  or  wrath  by  physical  objects  or 
conditions,  whereas  the  God  of  the  prophets  is  so  moved  by  moral 
considerations  only  (reckoning  idolatry  for  the  moment  as  a  part 
of  morality). 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  171 

The  old,  outward  conception  of  religious  uncleanness  as  caused 
by  things,  and  not  only  by  immoral  acts,  is  still  present  in  the 
Pentateuchal  laws ;  it  was  maintained  and  sadly  elaborated  by  the 
Rabbis.  It  is  the  motive  of  an  immense  number  of  their  laws 
about  women,  and  is  doubtless  also  the  motive  of  their  laws  about 
ablutions.  But,  as  Additional  Note  10  explains,  there  are  two  kinds 
of  cleanness:  there  is  (i)  the  'cleanness'  which  every  layman  must 
observe ;  there  is  (2)  the  cleanness  of  the  priest,  which  the  layman 
has  only  then  partially  to  observe  when  he  enters  the  Temple  at 
Jerusalem,  or  performs  some  specific  religious  act.  The  second 
was  far  more  onerous  than  the  first.  Christian  commentators 
frequently  confuse  the  two  together,  and  burdens  are  assigned 
to  the  ordinary  life  of  the  lay  Jew  from  which  he  was  and  is 
entirely  free. 

These  confusions  are  indicated  in  the  note.  But  the  principle 
of  ritual  uncleanness  was  not  disputed,  though  the  old  superstitions, 
and  the  more  ancient  conceptions  upon  which  it  ultimately  rested, 
had  entirely  disappeared.  Ritual  uncleanness  had  no  more  any- 
thing to  do  with  spirits  or  hostile  influences.  It  existed  because 
it  was  in  the  Law,  because  God  had  ordained  it.  The  prohibition 
of  rabbit  and  hare  was  regarded  either  as  due  to  the  fact  that 
these  were  sacred  animals  in  heathen  religions,  or,  simply,  as  due 
to  the  fact  that  God,  for  some  good  reason,  thought  it  better  for 
the  Israelite  not  to  eat  these  animals.  Feelings  of  disgust  soon 
grew  up  in  regard  to  the  animals  which  were  forbidden.  Hygienic 
motives  also  played  their  part.  The  holy  God  was  supposed  to 
regard  physical  as  well  as  moral  foulness  with  disgust,  and  the 
Israelite,  who  must  be  holy  like  his  God,  was  to  keep  himself  from 
the  one  foulness  as  well  as  from  the  other.  There  was  a  tendency 
to  pass  from  the  old  conceptions  of  ritual  uncleanness  to  the  newer 
conceptions  which  are  expressed  in  the  proverb,  '  Cleanliness  is 
next  to  godliness.'  Spiritual  purity  may  not  unreasonably  be 
symbolized  or  typified  by  material  purity.  A  dirty  church  or 
synagogue  strikes  us  as  peculiarly  inappropriate  and  undesirable. 
But  all  this  is  a  very  different  thing  from  technical  religious  un- 
cleanness in  the  legal  sense.  For  the  other  sort  of  uncleanness, 
which  the  proverb  speaks  of,  we  need  no  laws  or  casuistical 
enactments.  Common  sense,  and  cultivated  feelings  of  decency 
and  propriety,  are  safe  and  adequate  guides.  Where  these  fail, 
laws  and  enactments  will  not  supply  their  place  and  fill  the 
deficiency. 

Jesus  was,  therefore,  I  think,  quite  right  in  the  great  principle 
which  he  lays  down  in  Mark  vii.  15.  It  is  the  same  principle  as 
that  involved  and  implied  in  the  superb  saying  of  Theano,  the 
wife  or  daughter  of  Pythagoras.    @eavci)  ipwrrjdelcra  voaraia  yw^ 


172  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIL  1-23 

air  dvhpo<s  Kadapexiei,  'Aito  fiev  tov  IBiov,  scire,  iTapa')(^pfifj,a,  a-rro 
ie  TOV  dXKoTpiov,  ovBeTrore.  Such  a  saying  lifts  a  load,  and  re- 
moves a  nightmare,  from  the  human  mind  and  thought.  A  mass 
of  ritual  superstitions  is  made  superfluous.  The  world  is  profoundly 
indebted  to  Jesus  for  his  liberating  and  clarifying  words.  They  are 
spoken  in  the  very  spirit  of  Amos  and  Hosea.  The  true  province 
of  religion  needed  to  be  defined.  It  was  made  the  greater  and  the 
purer  by  being  limited  to  the  realms  of  spirit  and  personality. 
The  dietary  laws  and  the  laws  of  clean  and  unclean  have  doubtless 
often  led,  as  they  led  in  the  days  of  Jesus,  to  formalism,  hypocrisy, 
self-righteousness.  Outward  '  cleanliness '  can  often  mask  inward 
corruption. 

Yet,  though  all  this  be  so,  it  was  impossible  for  the  Jews 
to  accept  the  saying,  nor  can  we  safely  say  that  Jesus  was  con- 
sistent in  asserting  it.  For  though  the  occasion  which  (as  Mark 
tells  the  story)  drew  it  forth  was  a  Rabbinical  law,  though  it  was 
only  a  Rabbinical  law  which  the  disciples  transgressed,  yet  the 
great  principle  laid  down  by  Jesus  runs  directly  counter  to  the 
laws  of  the  Pentateuch. 

Now  the  Pentateuch  makes  no  difference  between  some  laws 
and  other  laws.  It  does  not  say  the  moral  laws  are  divine  and 
eternal,  the  ritual  laws  are  human  and  temporary ;  it  ascribes  the 
same  divinity  and  immutability  to  them  all. 

From  the  Pentateuchal  and  Rabbinic  point  of  view,  the  dietary 
laws,  the  laws  about  women,  the  laws  about  corpses  and  ablutions, 
were  as  much  given  by  the  wise  and  righteous  God  as  were  the 
laws  about  honouring  our  parents  or  loving  our  neighbours.  If 
the  one  set  of  laws  is  divine,  so  is  the  other  set.  It  was  quite 
illogical  for  Jesus,  in  one  breath,  to  appeal  to  the  'Law  of  God,' 
violated  by  Rabbinical  enactment,  and  to  enunciate  a  principle 
antagonistic  to  that  Law  in  another.  The  dialectically  trained 
Rabbis  must  have  seen  the  flaw  in  Mark  vii.  15.  Jesus  did  not 
say  that  the  Pentateuch  was  not  in  all  its  parts  the  Law  of  God. 
He  did  not  bid  his  disciples  to  violate  the  ceremonial  law.  He 
did  not  urge  them  to  eat  rabbit  and  hare.  All  he  wished  them  to 
neglect  was  the  Rabbinical  law  about  washing  the  hands.  It  was 
only  in  reference  to  that  law  that  he  enunciated  his  principle. 
Yet  this  great  principle  flies  in  the  face  of  the  dietary  laws  which 
are  ordered  in  the  Pentateuch  by  God.  But  if  the  wise  and 
perfect  God  has  ordered  them,  they  too  are  wise  and  perfect.  If 
the  wise  and  peif'ect  God  has  said  that  what  enters  into  man's 
mouth  can  and  does  defile  him,  then  He  must  be  right  and  Jesus 
must  be  wrong. 

How  far  Jesus  was  conscious  of  his  own  inconsistency  is 
doubtful.     How  far  in   his  own  mind  he  separated  the  moral 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 73 

from  the  ritual  law,  and  thought  that  God  had  ordered  the 
one,  but  had  not  ordered  the  other,  we  do  not  know.  But  we 
do  know  that  he  never  enunciated  the  principle  of  such  a  separation 
and  difference  of  origin.  Moreover,  there  are  a  few  indications 
that  he  himself  obeyed  and  urged  others  to  obey  the  ritual  laws 
of  the  Pentateuch.  Loisy  observes:  'It  may  be  admitted  that 
Jesus  does  not  directly  attack  legal  observances,  but  he  believes 
and  affirms,  at  least  implicitly,  that  these  prescriptions  have  not 
in  themselves  a  moral  character;  in  any  case,  he  lays  down  a 
principle  which  destroys  them'  {E.  S.  I.  p.  959). 

But  if  Jesus  was  unaware  of  his  own  inconsistency,  the  Rabbis 
must  have  perceived  it  well  enough,  and  they  were  quite  justified 
in  denying  his  principle  and  the  authority  of  him  who  uttered  it. 

The  truth  is  that  Amos  could  have  uttered  the  principle 
without  inconsistency,  because  in  his  day  there  was  no  perfect 
immutable  divine  Mosaic  Law  in  existence ;  and  we,  to-day,  can 
consistently  utter  the  principle  because  we  no  longer  believe  in 
such  a  Law — because  we  do  separate  the  moral  from  the  ritual — 
but  Jesus  could  only  utter  the  principle  at  the  cost  of  an  in- 
consistency, which  does  not,  indeed,  lessen  the  greatness  of  the 
principle  or  of  him  who  spoke  it,  but  which  justifies,  exonerates 
and  explains  the  opposition  and  disbelief  of  the  Rabbis  and 
Pharisees,  who  saw  more  clearly  than  Jesus  whither  the  principle 
must  tend  and  how  much  it  implied. 

We  may  agree  with  J.  Weiss  that  the  principle  laid  down 
by  Jesus  was  of  epoch-making  greatness  and  significance.  More 
questionable,  however,  is  it  where  he  says :  '  Hier  ringt  sich  aus 
einer  Religion  des  Kultus  und  des  Priestertums  eine  neue  Religion 
der  Inneriichkeit  und  des  Gewissens  los.'  For  what  the  Lutheran 
commentator  cannot  fathom  is  that  there  can  be  a  religion  of 
forms  and  ceremonies,  and  even  of  priests,  which  may  also  be, 
for  many  of  its  believers  and  practisers,  a  religion  of  inwardness 
and  conscience.  The  two  religions  are  not  necessarily  contra- 
dictions in  terms.  And  still  more  false  is  it  when  he  goes  on 
to  say :  '  Mit  diesem  Gedanken  ist  dem  Judentum  die  Axt  an 
die  Wurzel  gelegt.'  Is  there  only,  can  there  only  be,  one  kind 
of  Judaism?  We  know  better.  And  surely,  of  all  others,  a 
commentator  like  J.  Weiss  should  be  the  last  to  make  these 
rash  assertions.  What !  There  can  be  a  Christianity  without 
miracles,  without  the  virgin  birth,  without  a  bodily  resurrection, 
without  the  divinity  of  Christ  in  any  dogmatic  sense  of  the  word, 
but  there  can  be  no  Judaism  without  the  dietary  laws  and  the 
conception  of  physical  and  outward  purity !  Liberal  Judaism  has 
at  least  as  good  a  right  to  its  name  as  the  non-miraculous  Unitarian 
Christianity  of  Weiss. 


174  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

It  may  also  be  observed  that  it  is  quite  possible  for  a  modern 
Jew  to  observe,  and  justify  his  observance  of,  dietary  laws  while 
yet  admitting  the  truth  of  the  principle  of  Mark  vii.  15.  He  can 
be  quite  free  from  the  old  superstitious  idea  that  any  material 
thing  is  religiously  unclean,  but  he  may  yet  maintain  that  the 
discipline  and  self-restraint  and  self-sacrifice  involved  in  (e.g.) 
observing  a  number  of  dietary  laws  among  an  environment  which 
does  not  observe  them  may  have  useful  ethical  results.  He  will 
not  maintain  that  the  laws  are  from  God,  but  he  will  argue  that 
they  form  a  useful  bond  for  '  keeping  Jews  together/  for  '  main- 
taining a  connection  with  the  past,'  and  that  for  these  reasons, 
■as  well  as  for  their  ethical  value  as  a  discipline,  he  chooses  freely 
to  obey  them  freely.  As  regards  the  special  Jewish  method  of 
'  killing,'  he  may  say  that  it  is  more  merciful.  And  all  the  dietary 
laws  he  may  justify  and  cling  to  on  the  ground  of  hygiene.  He 
may  even,  though  perhaps  somewhat  fancifully,  argue  that  the 
connection  between  the  moral  and  physical  nature  of  man  is 
subtle  and  obscure,  and  that  allegiance  to  dietary  law.s  may 
have  some  undefinable  but  real  moral  influence.  Such  an  atti- 
tude is  quite  justifiable,  but  largely  modern.  It  does  not  really 
touch  or  affect  the  question  as  it  presented  itself  either  to  Jesus 
or  to  the  Rabbis. 

16  has  probably  been  interpolated  from  iv.  9,  23. 

17-23.  This  is  the  commentary  upon,  or  explanation  of, 
verse  15.  It  is  closely  parallel  to,  and  modelled  on,  the  section 
iv.  10-20,  which  explains  the  parable  of  the  sower.  'L'61a- 
boration  de  la  pr^sente  p^ricope  appartient  k  la  meme  couche 
traditionnelle.'  Thus  M.  Loisy,  who  goes  on  to  make  the  following 
interesting  remarks.  'The  question  of  the  disciples  excites  the 
same  astonishment  in  the  Saviour  as  in  the  section  of  the  sower ; 
they  are  then  as  destitute  of  intelligence  as  the  crowd!  This 
kind  of  appreciation  of  the  intellectual  resources  of  the  Galilsean 
apostles  may  very  well  be  a  more  important  and  more  certain 
trace  of  Paulinism  than  those  which  it  has  been  sometimes  sought 
to  discover  in  the  second  Gospel.  For  the  Christ  goes  on  to  show 
them  that  foods  are  neither  clean  nor  unclean,  that  morality  is 
not  concerned  with  the  material  of  nourishment ;  he  teaches  them 
therefore  one  of  the  doctrines  which  is  dearest  to  Paul,  and 
which  it  must  be  supposed  that  they  afterwards  forgot,  if  Jesus 
really  said  to  them  what  Mark  relates  in  this  passage.  But  the 
doctrine  of  Paul  is  not  treated  in  the  manner  of  Paul ;  it  is  dis- 
cussed from  the  point  of  view  of  common  sense,  and  in  that 
homiletical    tone    and    rather    heavy  and   diffuse    style  which 


VII.  1-23]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  175 

characterises  the  explanation  of  the  sower.... There  is  nothing 
in  the  idea  which  is  not  in  conformity  with  the  spirit  of  Jesus, 
but  it  is  expressed  with  a  kind  of  rude  naivete  which  we  do 
not  find  in  his  discourses'  {E.  8.  I.  p.  964).  W.  says  more 
laconically  that  17-23  stands  in  the  same  relation  to  1-15  as 
iv.  10-20  stands  to  iv.  1-9  (Einleitimg,  p.  55). 

18  repeats  or  explains  15.  Only  the  heart,  the  will,  can  be 
really  good  or  evil.  Only  the  will,  the  heart,  can  be  profaned  or 
defiled.  Kant's  famous  dictum,  'There  is  nothing  good  but  a  good 
will,'  is  another  form  of  Jesus's  principle. 

19  is  grammatically  hard.  The  nominative  participle  xada- 
pi^tov  seems  to  agree  with  the  accusative  d(f)eSpmva. 

The  word  d<f)eSpd>v,  only  found  here,  is  usually  translated 
'privy,'  though  why  the  'privy'  can  be  said  to  cleanse  food  is 
not  quite  easy  to  see.  Perhaps  it  is  said  to  do  so,  as  Schanz 
holds,  because  it  receives  and  removes  all  those  parts  of  food 
which  the  human  body  cannot  assimilate  and  are  unsuitable  for 
the  maintenaace  of  life.  W.  says  that  d^eSpcov  means  bowel 
(Barmkanal).  The  bowel  purifies  food,  in  that  it  ejects  what 
is  'unclean.'  Suidas  says  that  d<\>ehpd)v  signifies  to  fji,epo<s  tov 
am/iaTo<!  to  irepl  tt^v  e^oBov.  The  manuscript  '  D '  has  6')(^eT6<;, 
which  means  the  intestinal  canal.  The  S.S.  has  a  different,  and, 
as  Merx  thinks,  a  truer  reading,  which  would  mean  that  food 
does  not  cause  impurity,  inasmuch  as  it  simply  passes  through 
the  body,  is  evicted,  and  does  not  enter  the  heart. 

Some  commentators  have  thought  that  KaOapi^tov  refers  back 
to  \iyei.  '  Thus  spake  he — ,  making  all  foods  clean.'  But  Kada- 
pi^tov  seems  too  far  off  to  go  with  Xeyei,  though  it  makes  fine  and 
trenchant  meaning  if  so  interpreted.  It  is  thus  taken  by  R.V. 
The  words  "making  all  things  clean'  may,  thus  regarded,  be  a 
note  by  an  editor  who  sees  the  wide  effect  of  Jesus's  words.  The 
addition  necessitates  the  resumption  of  the  speech  by  eXeyev  Se 
on  in  20. 

20.  The  outward  material  thing  cannot  cause  spiritual  or 
religious  impurity.  The  seat  of  impurity,  as  of  purity,  is  the 
heart,  the  will.  Thence  spring  evil  thoughts  and  passions,  which 
result  in  evil  words  and  deeds.  These  go  out  of  a  man  and  defile 
him.  Menzies  holds  that  20  is  •  a  word  of  Jesus  bearing  on  the 
subject  in  hand  and  suitably  placed  here.  The  three  following 
verses  seem  to  be  added  by  the  Evangelist,  in  illustration.  The 
list  of  sins  is  very  similar  to  those  in  Galatians  v.  19-21  and 
Romans  i.  29-31.' 


176  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  1-23 

'  The  thought  of  the  Evangelist  is  clearly  defined,  though  his 
style  is  confused.  He  condemns  the  whole  system  of  uncleanness 
and  legal  purification,  in  order  to  place  the  idea  of  cleanness  and 
uncleanness,  of  good  and  evil,  where  it  ought  to  be,  that  is  in  the 
conscience  of  man,  not  in  the  materiality  of  external  objects. ,  He 
is  thinking,  moreover,  only  of  Jewish  observances,  and  he  did  not 
mean  that  greediness  was  not  a  sin ;  for  excess  in  eating  and 
drinking  comes  from  a  perverse  will,  and  it  is  not  for  what  he 
takes,  but  for  the  excess  committed  when  he  takes  it,  that  man  is 
to  be  blamed.  Nor  did  he  mean  to  condemn  fasting,  which  does 
not  imply  the  moral  reprobation  of  the  food  from  which  one 
abstains,  and  which  gets  all  its  value  from  the  will  which 
inspires  it.  Merit  and  sin  have  their  principle,  not  in  the  things 
themselves,  but  in  the  persons  who  use  them  '  {E.  S.  I.  p.  966). 

Looking  back  upon  the  whole  incident  after  1900  years,  we 
see  that  while  both  parties  had  a  certain  right  upon  their  side, 
though  neither  could  persuade  the  other,  Jesus  was  more  pro- 
foundly right  and  more  essentially  true.  The  future  was  with 
him,  not  with  the  Rabbis  and  Pharisees.  His  principle  would 
gradually  win  the  day.  It  represented  a  higher  and  purer  con- 
ception of  religion  than  the  opposing  principle  which  is  embodied 
in  the  Pentateuchal  law.  Liberal  Judaism  has  consciously  accepted 
it.  Jesus  himself,  with  his  keen  moral  and  religious  intuitions, 
went  straight  to  the  essential  truths  of  religion.  He  probably 
did  not  realize  the  conflict  between  the  principle,  which  he  had 
laid  down  with  such  clear  conviction,  and  the  teachings  of  the 
Law.  Such  conflicts  between  new  and  old  are  often  invisible 
to  those  who,  while  ardently  possessed  of  new  creative  truths, 
have  not  thought  out  their  relation  to  old  doctrine  in  which  they 
still  partially  believe.  In  this  respect  the  Rabbis  saw,  likely 
enough,  more  clearly  than  Jesus.  But  for  all  that,  his  conception 
of  religion  was  in  this  point,  just  because  the  Rabbis  were  tied  to 
the  perfection  and  divineness  of  a  heterogeneous  code,  profounder 
and  truer  than  theirs. 

Prof.  Pfleiderer,  I  notice,  says  much  the  same.  He  holds  that 
Jesus  was  unaware  of  the  implications  of  his  own  principle,  and 
that  he  did  not  consciously  intend  to  attack  the  Pentateuchxd  law. 
'It  is  the  nature  of  all,  and  especially  of  religious  heroes  and 
reformers  (think  of  Luther!)  in  the  most  exalted  moments  of 
their  struggle  against  the  old  to  utter  thoughts,  the  far-reaching 
range  of  which  is  concealed  even  from  themselves,  and  compared 
with  which  the  conservative  moods  of  their  quiet  days  lag  far 
behind.  Hence  the  manifold  contradictions  in  the  life  and 
thought  of  the  men,  in  whose  minds  two  epochs  struggle  against 
one  another'  (Pfleiderer,  Urchristentum,  1.  p.  356). 


VIL  24-30]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  177 

24-30.   The  Noethwakd  Journey  and  the  Phcenician  Woman 
{Op.  Matt.  XV.  21-28) 

4  And  from  thence  lie  arose,  and  went  into  the  district  of  Tyre. 
And  he  entered  into  an  house,  and  wished  that  none  should  know 

5  it :  but  he  could  not  escape  notice.     For,  straightway,  a  woman, 
whose  young  daughter  had  an  unclean  spirit,  and  who  had  heard 

6  of  him,  came  and  fell  at  his  feet :  (now  the  woman  was  a  heathen, 
a  Syrophoenician  by  race) ;  and  she  besought  him  that  he  would 

7  expel  the  demon  from  her  daughter.     But  Jesus  said  unto  her, 
'  Let  the  children  first  be  filled :  for  it  is  not  meet  to  take  the 

18  children's  bread,  and  to  cast  it  unto  the  dogs.'    And  she  answered 
and  said  unto  him, '  Yes,  Lord :  yet  the  dogs  under  the  table  eat 

19  of  the  children's  crumbs.'    And  he  said  unto  her, '  For  this  saying 
io  go  thy  way ;  the  demon  has  gone  out  of  thy  daughter.'     And 

when  she  came  to  her  house,  she  found  her  daughter  Ijdng  upon 
the  bed,  and  the  demon  had  departed. 

What  lay  before  Mark  as  his  authority  for  the  story  of  the 
Canaanite  woman  ?  B.  Weiss  insists  that  the  story  was  already 
included  in  Q,  and  that  it  is  Q's  version  which  we  find  in  Matthew; 
Loisy  is  more  cautious.  But  he  and  others  hold  that  verse  27  in 
Mark  with  its  addition  ('  Let  the  children  be  first  satisfied ')  is 
secondary  as  compared  with  Matt.  xv.  26.  Hence  Mark  must  have 
found  the  story  already  '  r^digee,'  and  possibly  Matthew  may  have 
known  and  used  the  source, '  plus  simple  et  plus  succincte,'  which 
is  at  the  base  of  Mark.  But  even  if  we  accept  the  very  plausible 
view  that  Matt.  xv.  26  is  primary,  it  might  be  that  little  more  or 
no  more  than  this  saying  was  known  to  Matthew,  and  that  for  the 
story  he  entirely  depends  upon  Mark. 

24.  eKelOev.  That  is,  probably,  from  Gennesaret  (vi.  fin.). 
The  section  vii.  1—24  is  interpolated.  What  is  the  motive  for 
this  journey?  It  has  been  variously  interpreted.  Was  it  to 
enable  Jesus  to  be  alone  with  his  disciples  and  to  teach  them 
especially  as  to  the  lot  which  was  to  befall  their  Master  ?  This 
seems  very  doubtful,  in  vie\?  of  their  subsequent  amazement  and 
incomprehension.  Was  it  to  avoid  the  plotting  Pharisees,  who 
sought  to  kill  the  innovating  teacher  ?  This  is  conceivable,  but 
not  probable.    Did  he  seek  for  rest  and  quiet  to  meditate  upon  his 


178  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII.  24-30 

future  prospects  and  chances  ?  The  entire  journey  (i.e.  not  only 
24  but  31)  is  more  probably  due  to  the  reasons  given  on  yi.  30-33. 
But  it  is  strange  that  Jesus,  instead  of  going  to  Bethsaida  as  he 
had  intended,  changes  his  route  and  goes  north.  The  territory  of 
Tyre  formed  the  northern  border  of  Galilee.  Is  this  particular 
journey  of  Jesus  placed  here,  as  J.  Weiss  thinks,  to  indicate  that,  in 
true  consistence  with  what  we  have  just  heard,  Jesus  did  not  con- 
sider the  heathen  as  unclean?  Wernle  (who  thinks  that  Mark 
had  little  before  him  but  isolated  stories,  sayings,  and  traditions) 
supposes  that  the  journey  is  fabricated.  '  Mark  had  before  him  the 
story  of  Jesus's  meeting  with  the  Gentile  woman  and  the  help 
•which  he  gave  her ;  this  needed  a  scene  in  a  Gentile  district,  and 
accordingly  Jesus  must  have  journeyed  into  the  neighbourhood  of 
Tyre '  (Sources  of  our  knowledge  of  the  Life  of  Jesus,  translated  by 
Xummis,  1907,  p.  123). 

26.  She  was  a  Phoenician  by  race  and  nationality,  a  Greek, 
•i.e.  a  heathen,  by  religion. 

27.  Jesus  very  clearly  and  somewhat  unkindly  states  that  his 
own  mission  is  restricted  to  the  Jews. 

'Dog'  was  a  frequent  term  of  abuse  and  contempt  used  by 
Je^ws  about  Gentiles.  If  it  be  true  that  Kvvdpiov  means  the  house, 
or  domesticated,  dog,  it  is  improperly  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus. 
The  language  of  the  statement  is  assimilated  to  that  of  the  reply, 
where  it  is  in  place. 

'  Let  the  children  be  satisfied  first ' :  Matthe^w  omits  these 
•words,  and  apparently  this  is  more  original.  They  are  a  softening 
of  the  uncompromising  reply  and  suggest  the  woman's  answer. 
They  are  often  said  to  be  due  to  Pauline  influences  (cp.  Eomans 
i.  1 6,  ii.  10,  ix.  24).  In  any  case  it  does  seem  pretty  clear  that  they 
give  a  theoretic  basis  for  the  later  view  that,  while  the  Jews  were 
to  be  offered  the  gospel  first,  the  Gentiles  were  to  receive  it  next. 
The  food  of  salvation  is  destined  for  them  also.  The  '  children '  in 
the  interpolated  clause  anticipate  the  use  of  the  word  in  the 
original  response.  How  could  Jesus,  says  Loisy,  have  told  the 
woman  that  her  child  would  be  healed  when  he  had  completed  all 
the  miracles  he  had  to  accomplish  in  Israel  ?  Mark  has  allegorized 
the  saying  and  the  story.  He  looks  to  the  future:  the  original 
saying  did  not.  B.  Weiss  notices  that  ov  koXov  is  specifically 
Marcan :  Matthew's  ovk  e^ea-riv  is  more  original.  For  another 
view  see  the  note  on  Matt.  xv.  28. 

28.  Only  here  is  Jesus  called  Kvpte  in  Mark.  It  is  a  heathen 
woman  who  calls  him  so.     The  appellation,  however,  may  mean 


VII.  24-30]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  1 79 

no  more  than  our '  sir.'  For  the  real  meaning  of  the  word  mis- 
translated 'crumbs'  (rather  'bits  of  bread')  see  note  on  Luke 
xvi.  21.  The  admirable  reply  of  the  woman  is  both  touching  and 
brilliant :  '  there  is  a  place  for  dogs  in  the  household,  and  there  is 
a  place  for  Gentiles  in  God's  world '  (Gould). 

29.  Jesus  is  moved  by  her  humility  and  courage.  He  declares 
that  her  request  has  been  granted  because  of  her  noble  reply. 
Matthew  makes  Jesus  praise  her  faith,  the  greatness  of  which 
induces  (and  perhaps  enables)  him  to  grant  her  prayer.  The 
emphasis  upon  faith  most  authorities  regard  as  specifically 
characteristic  of  Matthew,  but  B.  Weiss  attributes  it  already  to  Q. 
It  is  too  subtle  an  explanation  when  he  says  that  Mark  by  his 
change  wishes  to  indicate  that  Jesus  fulfils  the  woman's  request 
because,  as  her  reply  shows,  she  recognizes  the  prerogative  of  Israel 
while  pointing  out  how  he  may  nevertheless  heal  her  child.  It  is 
noticeable  that  the  healing  takes  place '  from  afar,'  merely  by  '  word,' 
which  is  unusual  in  Mark.  The  other  instance  was  the  healing 
of  the  centurion's  son.  Both  are  cases  of  heathens  being  healed. 
Do  the  Evangelists  mean  to  imply  that  the  Gentiles  will  be  'saved' 
by  the  '  Word,'  without  the  bodily  presence  of  the  Christ  ?  So 
Augustine,  and  M.  Loisy  agrees.  Yet  he  thinks  that  there  must 
have  been  a  traditional  story  or  memory,  which  was  originally  quite 
independent  of  all  symbolic  interpretation  {E.  8.  i.  p.  977).  But 
the  highly  miraculous  character  of  the  story  makes  its  accuracy 
suspicious.  For  Jesus  suddenly  cures  a  third  person,  who  knows 
presumably  nothing  about  him.  The  child  is  cured  through  the 
courageous  faith  of  its  mother.  This  is  sheer  miracle.  It  seems 
to  me  an  instance  of  false  exegesis  and  a  wrong  way  of  trying  to 
strip  a  narrative  of  its  miraculous  quality  in  order  to  preserve  its 
historical  character  when  Holtzniann  says :  '  The  girl  meanwhile 
had  become  quiet,'  and  upon  her  return  the  mother  finds  her 
'  lying  upon  the  bed,  probably  exhausted  after  the  last  attack.  It 
is  only  Matthew  who  speaks  of  an  immediate  and  permanent 
result.'  Surely  Mark  implies  a  complete  and  instantaneous  cure 
no  less  than  Matthew.  Are  we  really  to  suppose  that  the  story  is 
historical  so  far  as  the  request  of  the  woman  and  the  reply  of 
Jesus  are  concerned,  but  false  as  regards  the  cure?  The  child 
was  lying,  after  a  severe  attack,  exhausted  and  quiet  upon  its  bed. 
There  was  no  cure.     This  seems  an  unsatisfactory  solution. 

Wellhausen  notes  that  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  prin- 
ciple, or  line  of  action,  laid  down  by  Jesus  in  his  reply,  which  he 
is  induced  exceptionally  to  abandon  in  this  case,  was  seriously 
meant,  and  had  hitherto  been  followed.  Though  he  never  says  so 
expressly,  and  lays  no  stress  upon  it,  Mark  regards  it  as  self-evident 

12—2 


1 80  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VII,  24-30 

that  Jesus  should  limit  his  activity  to  the  Jews,  proclaim  the 
Kingdom  of  God  to  them,  and  summon  them  to  repentance.  Such 
utterances  as  those  in  Matt.  viii.  11  are  never  found  in  Mark. 
Only  in  the  [late]  eschatological  speech,  Mark  xiii.  10,  does  Jesus 
predict  the  extension  of  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  to  the  heathen. 
But  has  not  W.  omitted  to  notice  the  implication  of  xiv.  9  ?  Yet 
this  verse  too  is  almost  certainly  later  than  Jesus. 

Schmidt,  I  am  inclined  to  think,  tends  to  be  a  little  one-sided 
when  he  refuses  to  believe  that  Jesus  could  have  shared  the  usual 
Jewish  limitations  as  regards  the  heathen  world.  Still,  let  my 
readers  judge  for  themselves.  Schmidt  says :  '  There  is  no  reason 
to  question  the  assistance  Jesus  gave  to  the  child  of  a  Phoenician 
woman.  But  the  conversation  that  is  said  to  have  taken  place 
is  quite  incredible.  It  is  as  impossible  to  believe  that  Jesus  should 
have  refused  to  help  a  sufferer  in  Northern  Syria  on  the  ground 
that  it  would  not  be  right  to  help  a  dog  of  a  Gentile,  as  that  he 
would  praise  as  an  instance  of  marvellous  faith  her  willingness 
to  debase  herself  by  accepting  such  a  gratuitous  insult  in  order  to 
secure  a  favour.  It  is  sad  enough  that  a  Jewish  Christian  was 
still  capable  of  inventing  this  story.  The  more  difficult  it  was  to 
make  his  thought  understood  in  these  foreign  parts,  the  more 
anxious  Jesus  must  have  been  to  commend  his  message  by  deeds 
of  kindness '  (Prophet  of  Nazareth,  p.  276).  J.  Weiss  has  another 
explanation.  Jesus  has  left  Galilee  because  he  realizes  that  the 
Jews  are  impervious  to  his  teaching.  They  are  hopeless.  He 
wants  to  be  alone;  he  is  immediately  troubled  by  this  heathen 
woman.  For  a  moment  he  is  upset  by  the  situation  and  answers 
gloomily.  Yet  the  cloud  soon  lifts,  and  he  is,  as  ever,  ready  to 
help  a  human  being  in  the  hour  of  need.  J.  Weiss  knows  too 
much,  I  fancy,  nor  was  the  object  of  Jesus's  journey  a  desire  to  be 
alone  because  the  Jews  were  impervious  to  his  teaching. 

Loisy  thinks  that  the  story  is  more  or  less  historic ;  it  rests  upon 
fact,  but  the  significance  which  the  Evangelists  give  to  it  is  theirs 
alone.  Jesus  had  not  the  smallest  intention  to  announce  the 
Kingdom  to  the  Gentiles;  nor  does  he  mean  that  the  turn  of 
the  heathen  will  come  later.  Though  Mark's  account  is  more 
primitive  than  Matthew's,  or  rather,  as  Loisy  would  put  it,  though 
Mark  has  deviated  less  than  Matthew  from  the  original  source 
which  lay  before  them  both,  yet  it  is  he,  and  not  Jesus,  who  is 
responsible  for  the  words,  '  Let  the  children  be  satisfied  first '  in 
27.  Jesus  means  to  say  simply  that  his  miracles  are  wrought 
for  the  Jews,  the  children  of  God,  and  not  for  the  Gentiles,  who 
stand  towards  God  and  the  Jews  as  dogs  stand  to  the  master  and 
children  of  the  house.  There  is  no  thought  of  the  future.  Yet 
the  situation  of  the  story  must  be  real.    It  was  not  invented  for 


VII.  24-30]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARE  l8l 

the  saying.  That  saying  (about  the  dogs)  must  have  been  spoken 
on  an  occasion  '  analogous '  to  that  which  is  described  in  Mark  and 
Matthew.  Without  it,  Jesus  would  have  had  no  interest  to  define 
his  relation  to  the  heathen  {E.  8.  i,  pp.  970-977). 

The  story  is  one  of  great  beauty  and  charm.  Whence  this 
wonderful  attractiveness  of  so  much  of  the  Gospel  narrative,  this 
marvellous  combination  of  power  and  simplicity?  Whence  this 
impression  oi firstclassriess,  of  inspiration?  Surely  because  the 
Gospels  are  the  early  result  of  the  impression  produced  by  a  great 
and  inspired  personality.  However  uncertain  it  may  be  whether 
what  we  read  in  any  single  passage  was  really  said  or  done  by 
Jesus,  only  a  real  Jesus  could  have  caused  the  Gospel.  Without 
Jesus,  no  Mark. 

'The  sublime  figure  of  the  Christ,  portrayed  to  us  by  the  first 
three  Evangelists,  was,  in  a  certain  sense,  created  by  the  Church. 
But  if,  in  turn,  we  ask  what  was  the  moral  and  religious  power 
by  which  the  Church  was  created,  only  one  answer  is  possible : 
it  was  the  personality  of  Jesus,  his  faith,  his  truth,  his  love '  {First 
Three  Gospels,  p.  326). 

Nevertheless,  do  we  know  enough  of  the  life  of  Jesus  to  speak 
of  his  character  in  the  customary  terms  of  absolute  and  unqualified 
eulogy  ?  We  hear  that  his  life  was  a  perfect  exhibition  of  divine 
love,  that  it  was  one  long  and  perfect  sacrifice,  in  fact  that  it  was  a 
perfect  life,  the  product  of  a  perfect  character.  And  so  on,  with 
endless  variations.  And  yet  we  have  to  remember  that  Jesus 
lived  only  thirty-three  years  or  so,  and  that  of  this  short  life  we 
only  know  the  events  of  a  year  or  a  year  and  a  half.  In  the 
Galilsean  period  we  do  not  know  of  much  which  required  great 
sacrifice.  There  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  Jesus  lived  a  life 
of  great  pain,  difficulty,  and  renunciation.  A  religious  teacher 
who  made  a  great  impression  upon  many  was  well  looked  after. 
He  had  no  difficulty  in  obtaining  food  or  lodging. 

Again,  of  the  events  of  this  year  many  are  historically  dubious, 
many  are  mixed  up  with  incredible  miracles.  We  do  not  know 
(to  pass  on  to  the  Jerusalem  period)  whether  Jesus  went  up  to 
the  capital  to  conquer  or  to  die.  Let  us  assume  that  he  went 
to  die,  that  he  felt  that  his  own  death  was  the  necessary  pre- 
liminary for  the  full  establishment  of  the  Kingdom.  It  was  a 
fine  determination.  Nobody  would  wish  to  detract  from  it,  but 
I  cannot  perceive  that  even  this  act  of  self-sacrifice  entitles  us 
to  say  of  his  character  that  it  was  the  Tnost  perfect  character,  and 
of  his  life  that  it  was  the  most  perfect  life  that  has  ever  been 
lived.    It  is  a  life 

(o)  of  which  we  know  very  little,  and  only  during  some 
eighteen  months  in  all ; 


l82  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VH.  24-30 

(b)  of  which  the  incidents  are  very  few ; 

(c)  which  is  very  uncertain,  and  much  mixed  up  with 
miracle  and  legend ; 

(d)  which   is   recorded    by  biographers   who    seek    to 
eulogise  and  exalt  to  the  utmost  of  their  ability. 

While,  therefore,  willing  to  pay  my  tribute  of  admiration  to 
the  life  and  character  of  Jesus,  so  far  as  we  know  about  them  or 
can  ascertain  them,  I  cannot  see  any  reason  to  speak  of  them 
as  the  acme  and  embodiment  of  every  conceivable  perfection.  He 
is  a  great  teacher  and  a  noble  man,  whom  we  must  greatly  admire: 
our  adoration  will  be  reserved  for  God. 

Yet  through  the  mists  of  miracle  and  legend  we  see  a  character, 
not  indeed  perfect,  for  his  attitude  neither  to  his  mother  nor  to 
his  opponents  seems  to  me  without  question,  but  yet  noble ;  a 
character,  moreover,  finely  balanced  and  tempered.  Jesus  was 
virile,  but  gentle ;  severe,  but  pitiful.  He  was  confident,  yet 
humble.  Aloof  from  the  world,  yet  not  gloomy.  What  a  grand 
grip  he  had  upon  essentials,  upon  the  fatherhood  of  God,  and 
upon  the  service  of  God  in  the  service  of  man.  How  positive  was 
his  goodness.  How  he  hated  shams,  meanness,  hypocrisy,  self- 
righteousness.  These  hatreds  reveal  the  sort  of  man  he  was, 
filled  with  pity  for  the  outcasts  of  society,  with  scorn  for  the 
respectably  virtuous  who  so  carefully  avoided  evil  and  yet  per- 
formed so  little  good.  I  can  quite  realize  that  it  is  easy,  and  to 
those  brought  up  in  a  Christian  environment  justifiable,  upon  the 
basis  of  what  we  know  about  Jesus,  to  conjecture  and  amplify  and 
idealise.  'An  ideal,'  says  Jowett,  'necessarily  mingles  with  aU 
conceptions  of  Christ.'  This  ideal,  which  varies  from  age  to  age, 
'may  be  conveniently  spoken  of  as  the  life  of  Christ.'  But  this 
ideal  is  not  the  actual  character  or  actual  life  of  the  historic 
Jesus, '  of  a  person  scarcely  known  to  us,'  as  Jowett  admits,  whose 
biographies  are  fall  of  doubt  and  uncertainty  {Life  and  Letters  of 
Benjamin  Jowett,  Vol.  11.  pp.  151,  445). 

31-37.    Healing  of  a  Deaf  and  Dumb  Man 
{Gp.  Matt.  XV.  29-31) 

31  Then  he  left  the  district  of  Tyre,  and  came  by  way  of  Sidon 
unto  the  lake  of  Galilee,  through  the  midst  of  the  district  of  the 

32  Ten  Cities.     And  they  brought  unto  him  one  that  was  deaf  and 
stammered ;  and  they  besought  him  to  put  his  hand  upon  him. 

33  And  he  took  him  aside  from  the  crowd,  and  put  his  fingers  into 


VII.  31-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  183 

34  his  ears,  and  touched  his  tongue  with  his  spittle,  and  looking  up 
to  heaven,  he  sighed,  and  said  unto  him, ' Ephphatfia,'  that  is,  'Be 

35  opened.'     And  straightway  his  ears  were  opened,  and  the  fetter 

36  of  his  tongue  was  loosed,  and  he  spoke  plainly.  And  he  enjoined 
them  to  tell  no  one ;  but  the  more  he  enjoined  them,  the  more 

37  did  they  proclaim  it.  And  they  were  exceedingly  astonished, 
saying, '  He  has  done  all  things  well :  he  makes  the  deaf  to  hear^ 
and  the  dumb  to  speak.' 

31.  This  verse  would  indicate,  if  it  is  accurate,  that  Jesus' 
took  a  very  extended  journey  before  returning  to  the  Lake  of 
Galilee.  He  would  have  gone  far  northwards,  and  then  eastwards 
and  back  again  to  the  south.  But  so  protracted  a  journey  seems 
improbable.  It  appears  likely  that  Mark  wanted  to  place  the 
miracles  that  follow  upon  heathen  soil  for  the  sake  of  his  symbolism. 
They  are  wrought  as  Jesus  passes  through  the  Decapolis  on  his 
way  back  to  the  lake.  They  symbolize  the  salvation  of  the 
Gentiles  to  whom  the  gospel  is  also  to  be  rendered.  W.  thinks 
that  Sidon  is  a  misrendering  of  Saidan,  which  was  a  variant  for 
Betbsaida.  The  geography  of  Mark  is  somewhat  confused,  and 
gives  rise  to  much  discussion  in  the  commentators,  which  I  pass 
over  in  silence. 

32.  Is  the  man  a  Jew  ?  According  to  Loisy,  he  was  so  in  the 
traditional  story  which  had  no  special  place  or  time ;  to  Mark  he 
was  a  heathen,  and  he  symbolizes  the  giving  of  the  gospel  to  the 
Gentiles.     The  population  of  the  Decapolis  was  mixed. 

33.  The  healing  process  is  here  conducted  in  a  strange,  half- 
magical  way.  One  wonders  what  is  the  measure  of  historical  basis 
for  this  curious  tale.  Spittle  was  regarded  in  antiquity  as 
possessed  of  healing  properties.  Tacitus  records  that  Vespasian 
cured  a  blind  man  in  Alexandria  by  wetting  his  eyes  with  his 
spittle  {Histories,  iv.  81). 

34.  He  '  sighed.'  The  word  here  means  that  he  was  praying. 
For  the  prayer,  cp.  Elijah  in  i  Kings  xvii.  19-21  or  Elisha  in 
2  Kings  iv.  33-3 S. 

It  is  amusing  how  the  great  authorities  vary  in  their 
judgments.  To  W.  healings  by  touch  are  older  and  more  original 
than  healings  by  the  mere  word.  Mark  usually  makes  Jesus 
employ  a  touch  of  one  kind  or  another  (as  here),  rarely  a  mere 
word.  With  Matthew  it  is  otherwise.  J.  Weiss,  on  the  other 
hand,  thinks  touching  is  secondary.    According  to  the  oldest  view, 


1 84  THE  SYNOPTIC  aOSPELS  [VII.  31-37 

the  healings  of  Jesus  were  accomplished  by  a  mere  word.  Jesus 
'  orders '  the  "  demon  '  of  sickness.  The  conception  that  he  healed 
by  touch  is  more  reflective.  Still  more  so  is  the  idea  that  he  used 
popular  medicinal  means  (as  here).  The  miracle  becomes  less 
spiritual ;  but  also  there  is  a  sort  of  semi-rationalistic  explanation. 
W.'s  view  seems  to  me  more  likely  than  J.  Weiss's. 

Loisy  sees  nothing  necessarily  unlikely  in  Jesus  using  these 
remedies,  as  in  his  eyes  they  were.  Jesus  does  not  want  to  be 
regarded,  he  does  not  regard  himself,  as  an  all  powerful  worker 
of  miracles  by  his  own  mere  personality.  The  case  of  demon- 
expelling  stands  apart,  for  the  demons  are  personal  beings,  and  they 
must  be  expelled  by  the  mere  order  of  God's  messenger.  But  in 
the  case  of  ordinary  maladies  Jesus  either  attributes  his  healings 
to  the  faith  of  those  who  implore  his  aid,  or  he  acts  like  a  doctor, 
who  trusts  in  God  and  thinks  that  he  effects  his  cures  by  ordinary 
remedies  through  divine  help  So  with  words.  The  '  Word '  was 
also  a  remedy,  a  means  of  curing,  just  like  touching  a  little  saliva ; 
nevertheless  these  means  were  not  regarded  as  independent  of  the 
divine  will.  Thus  Loisy  denies  that  the  term  '  magic '  is  in  place, 
and  even  my  '  half-magical '  should  therefore,  according  to  him,  be 
deleted  {E.  S.  I.  p.  981). 

36.  Jesus  would  not  have  been  the  '  Menschenkenner '  he  was 
if  he  had  thought  that  such  a  miracle,  wrought  in  public,  could 
remain  unknown.  All  these  prohibitions  are  part  of  Mark's  theory, 
and,  likely  enough,  have  little  historic  basis. 

These  stories  are  partly  told,  and  partly  made  up,  with  an  eye 
to  the  fulfilment  of  prophecy.     Cp.  Isaiah  xxix.  18,  xxxv.  5,  6. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

1-9     Feeding  of  the  Fouk  Thousand 
(Gp.  Matt.  XV.  32-39) 

1  In  those  days  there  was  again  a  great  crowd,  and  they  had 
nothing  to  eat.    And  Jesus  called  his  disciples  unto  him,  and 

2  said  unto  them, '  I  feel  pity  for  the  people  because  they  have  now 

3  tarried  with  me  three  days,  and  have  nothing  to  eat:    and  if  I 
send  them  away  fasting  to  their  own  homes,  they  will  faint  by 

4  the  way :    moreover  some   of  them   came   from  far.'    And  his 
disciples  answered  him, '  Whence  can  one  satisfy  these  men  with 


VIII.  1-9]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  185 

5  bread  here  in  the  wilderness  ? '    And  he  asked  them, '  How  many 

6  loaves  have  ye  ? '  And  they  said,  '  Seven.'  And  he  bade  the 
people  to  sit  down  on  the  ground :  and  he  took  the  seven  loaves, 
and  spoke  the  blessing,  and  broke  them,  and  gave  them  to  his 

7  disciples  to  set  before  the  people ;  and  they  did  so.  And  they 
had  a  few  small  fishes :  and  he  spoke  the  blessing,  and  told  them 

8  to  set  these  also  before  the  people.  So  they  did  eat,  and  were 
satisfied :   and  they  took  up  of  the  broken  bits  that  were  left, 

9  seven  baskets  full.  And  they  who  had  eaten  were  about  four 
thousand. 

W.  notices  that  viii.  1-26  does  not  really  carry  the  story 
forward  from  the  point  at  which  it  had  arrived  in  vii.  37.  It  runs 
parallel  with  vi.  34 — vii.  37.  It  does  not  indeed  cover  the  whole 
ground,  viii.  1-9  corresponds  with  vi.  34-44  (the  miraculous 
feedings);  then  in  viii.  10-21  (itself  composite  and  interpolated) 
we  have  a  crossing  back  again  to  the  other  side  of  the  lake,  as  in 
vi.  46-52,  while  22-26  corresponds  with  vii.  31-37  (in  each  case  a 
similar  miracle).  For  vi.  53-56,  vii.  1-23,  vii.  24-30  there  are  no 
parallels.  These  sections  are,  however,  'vermutlich  ein  oder 
vielmehr  zwei  Zwischenstticke'  themselves.  Are  we  then  to  assume 
that  Mark  had  already  two  groups  of  written  passages  before  him, 
which  he  combined  ?  It  looks  rather  like  it.  But  W.  does  not 
like  to  admit  such  a  conclusion.  He  says :  '  Der  Umstand,  dass 
hier  nicht  bloss  einzelne  Varianten,  sondern  zwei  Gruppen  von 
Varianten  erscheinen,  gibt  zu  denken.  Doch  sind  die  Gruppen 
klein,  sie  bestehn  eigentlich  nur  aus  drei  Stticken,  die  schon  von 
der  mtindlichen  Tradition  in  dieser  Keihenfolge  batten  iiberliefert 
sein  konnen.' 

The  miracle  of  the  four  thousand  is  a  close  variant  of  the 
feeding  of  the  five  thousand  in  vi.  31-44.  Note  that  Jesus  again 
shows  pity  for  the  material  exhaustion  of  the  people.  In  vi.  34  he 
pities  their  spiritual  destitution.  Neither  pity  is  unhistorical.  He 
clearly  cared  for  people's  bodies  as  well  as  for  their  souls.  Gp.  v.  43. 
Mark  must,  it  is  supposed,  have  found  two  separate  miraculous 
feeding  stories  in  his  sources.  Probably  these  were  two  written 
sources.  Mark  seems  to  use  the  two  feeding  stories  for  two 
different  purposes.  The  one  symbolizes  the  preaching  of  the 
'  Word '  to  the  Jews ;  the  other  symbolizes  its  presentation  to  the 
heathen.  Jesus  alone  gives  the  true  Word,  which  the  peoples 
cannot  find  elsewhere. 

7.  The  parallelism  of  the  two  stories  extends  to  the  odd  way 
in  which  the  fishes  are  introduced,  for  in  both  they  seem  to  come. 


1 86  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  1-9 

as  M.  Loisy  says, '  quelque  peu  en  surcharge '  {E.  8. 1,  p.  987,  n,  3). 
It  is  a  question  whether  there  is  a  symbohsm  in  the  fish,  and  why 
they  have  been  added. 

8.  Note  that  the  word  for  'baskets'  dififers  in  the  two 
narratives.  In  the  first  it  is  k6<J)ivoi  ;  in  the  second  it  is  (Tirvpihe<i. 
This  points  to  two  different  written  sources. 


10-12.    A  Sign  Refused 
(Gp.  Matt.  xii.  38-42,  xvi.  1-4 ;  Luke  xi.  29-32) 

10  And  when  he  had  sent  them  away,  straightway  he  entered 
into  a  boat  with   his   disciples,  and   came   into  the  district  of 

11  Dalmanutha.  And  the  Pharisees  came  forth,  and  began  to  dis- 
pute with  him,  demanding  from  him  a  sign  from  heaven,  in  order 

12  to  tempt  him.  And  he  sighed  deeply  in  his  spirit,  and  said, 
'Wherefore  doth  this  generation  demand  a  sign?  verily  I  say 
unto  you,  There  shall  no  sign  be  given  unto  this  generation.' 

As  viii.  1-9  is  a  variant  of  vi.  34-44,  so  viii.  10  is  the  variant  of 
vi.  45.  In  both  cases,  after  the  miraculous  feeding,  Jesus  enters  a 
ship  and  crosses  over  the  lake. 

10.  Where  is  Dalmanutha?  Nobody  knows  for  certain:  some 
think  on  the  east,  some  on  the  west,  side  of  the  lake.  W.  thinks 
the  fonner.  J.  Weiss  the  latter.  He  supposes  that  this  scene 
with  the  Pharisees  should  really  be  connected  with  vi.  $3-56,  the 
healings  in  Gennesaret. 

11.  As  the  first  miracle  of  the  loaves  is  followed  by  the 
disputation  with  the  Pharisees  about  ablutions,  so  the  second  is 
followed  by  a  quarrel  about  '  signs.'  Loisy  supposes  that  the 
stories  are  inserted  from  the  same  motive  in  both  cases.  To  the 
gospel,  the  true  nurture  of  souls,  is  opposed  the  false  Judaism, 
which  is  'outward'  and  demands  'signs.'  He  also  believes  that 
II,  12  come  from  Q.  If  they  are  a  later  insertion,  as  W.  thinks, 
this  would  be  all  the  likelier.  The  Pharisees  are  represented,  as 
usual,  in  the  worst  light.  They  ask  Jesus  for  a  sign  in  order  to 
tempt  him.  Apparently  this  means  that  they  knew  that  Jesus 
ought  to  refuse  them — i.e.  that  he  ought  to  refuse  to  substantiate 
his  special  powers  or  his  Messiahship  by  miracles.  Or  does '  tempt- 
ing '  mean  that  they  believed  he  could  not  perform  a  miracle  on 


VIII.  IO-I2]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  187 

a  grand  scale,  and  that  they  tempted  him  to  try  so  that  he  might 
fail  ?  Dr  Carpenter,  however,  holds  that  'trying'  or  'testing  him' 
{•n-etpd^ovrei)  is  Mark's  interpretation.  The  demand  was  a  trial 
to  Jesus  because  he  felt  he  ought  to  refuse  it.  This  is  what 
Mark  wishes  to  indicate,  without  reference  to  the  purpose  of  the 
Pharisees. 

In  any  case,  they  are  the  bad  people  in  asking  for  a  '  sign ' ; 
Jesus  is  the  good  man  in  refusing  them.  At  the  best  they  suffer 
from  '  incurable  Wundersucht'  But  is  not  this  unjust  ?  Jesus,  in 
the  narrative  as  we  now  have  it,  had  already  performed  two 
gigantic  miracles,  which  were  surely  'signs,'  and  are  treated  as 
such  in  17-20.  Moreover  he  had  appealed  to  his  miracles  of 
healing,  yet,  by  his  own  admission,  there  were  Rabbinic  exorcists 
as  well  as  he.  And  successful  ones  too !  Hence,  when  Jesus 
made  assertions  implying  the  imperfections  of  the  Law,  was  it 
unreasonable  to  ask  for  a  special  miracle  in  order  to  prove  these 
bold  assertions  contradicting  the  letter  of  the  Law,  which  it  was 
a  dogma  of  faith  to  regard  as  true  and  perfect  from  beginning  to 
end  ?  Perhaps  Deut.  xiii.  1-3  should  have  made  them  refrain,  but 
the  passage  scarcely  applies,  for  Jesus,  at  all  events,  was  not 
suggesting  the  worship  of  '  other  gods.'  It  is  right  to  remember 
constantly  that  there  is  a  great  deal  to  be  said  for  the  Pharisees 
and  Rabbis,  whose  relations  with  Jesus  we  only  hear  of  from  their 
bitter  enemies,  who  wanted  to  depict  the  Master  as  all  light  and 
his  adversaries  all  darkness. 

The  reason  why  Jesus  refuses  the  miracle,  according  to 
J.  Weiss,  is  because  he  perceives  in  the  demand  the  unbelief,  the 
mockery  and  the  hatred  of  his  opponents.  Hence  he  is  filled  with 
bitterness  and  defiance.  To  demand  a  sign  is  the  proof  of  their 
ineradicable  'superficiality  and  outwardness.'  The  faith  that  Jesus 
required  is  of  a  quite  different  kind.  To  the  modern  Christian  of 
J.  Weiss's  school,  who  disbelieves  in  miracles,  this  may  be  very 
comforting.  But  the  superficiality  is  proved  none  the  more.  In 
the  days  of  Jesus  everybody  believed  in  miracles,  and  Jesus  was 
only  too  glad  when  people  believed  that  his  miracles  were  divinely 
ordered.  His  teaching  and  his  miracles  went  together.  But  that 
teaching  ran  counter  to  the  written  and  to  the  oral  Law.  Now 
the  Law  itself  had  foretold  that  prophets  might  arise  who  would 
'dare  to  speak  in  God's  name  what  God  had  not  commanded.' 
Was  it  not  likely  that  Jesus,  who  spoke  against  the  Law,  was  such 
a  prophet  ?  The  words  in  Deut.  xviii.  20-22  may  have  moved 
many  to  reflection.  If,  however,  Jesus  were  to  foretell  some  sign 
which  '  followed  and  came  to  pass,'  then,  perhaps,  it  might  be  safe 
to  think  that  God,  who  of  old  had  said  that  the  Law  was  to  be  a 
'  statute  for  ever  throughout  your  generations,'  had  really  changed 


1 88  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  lo-ia 

his  mind.     The  '  sign  from  heaven '  is  a  miracle  over  and  above 
mere  exorcisms  and  healings. 

W.  thinks  that  ii  and  12  are  a  later  insertion,  and  that  13 
repeats  10.  Those  who  were  dismissed  are  the  same  in  13  as  in  9. 
Jesus  could  not  so  lightly  'dismiss'  the  Pharisees.  'Again' 
{ttoXiv)  in  13  is  a  harmonising  way  out  of  the  difficulty. 

1 2.  '  Wherefore '  &c.  '  Der  Sinn  der  Frage  bei  Mc.  soil  wohl 
sein  :  sie  begehren  das  Zeichen  gar  nicht  wirklich,  warum  tun  sie 
denn  so  ? '  (Klostermann).  Or  it  may  be  that  the  meaning  of  the 
question  is  in  an  answer  which  is  implied  but  not  stated.  '  They 
ask  for  signs  with  a  wrong  motive,  therefore  I  will  not  give  them.' 
We  have  here  one  more  example  of  the  fact  that  neither  Jesus  nor 
the  Pharisees  could  understand  each  other.  From  their  point  of 
view  the  Pharisees  were  justified  in  showing  the  utmost  caution 
towards,  and  the  utmost  suspicion  of,  a  teacher  who  either  violated, 
or  taught  by  implication  the  violation  of,  the  Law.  A  sign  from 
their  point  of  view  was  reasonable  enough.  But  though  the 
Pharisees  may  have  been  justified  in  asking,  it  does  not  follow  that 
Jesus  was  not  right  in  refusing.  There  is  something  in  Gould's 
view,  though  it  is  pressed,  perhaps,  too  far  or  too  hard.  The  miracles 
of  Jesus  were  '  uses  of  divine  power,  but  not  displays  of  it.'  He 
refused  to  prove  his  power  by  empty  marvels  ad  hoc.  '  He  refuses 
to  do  anything  as  a  sign,  and  yet  his  life  was  full  of  signs.'  Note 
that  whereas  Isaiah  offers  a  sign  to  Ahaz,  who  says  that  he  will 
not  tempt  God,  Jesus  refuses  a  sign. 

The  Greek  MSS.  say  Jesus  'sighed  in  spirit'  (avaffrevafa?), 
but  the  S.S.  has,  '  he  was  wrath  in  spirit,'  which  Merx  thinks  is 
more  original. 


13-21.    The  Lack  of  Bread 
{Cp.  Matt.  xvi.  S-12 ;  Luke  xii.  i) 

13  And  he  lefb  them,  and  entering  into  the  boat  again,  crossed 

14  over  to  the  other  side.  Now  they  had  forgotten  to  take  bread 
with  them,  and  they  had  not  in  the  boat  more  than  one  loaf 

15  And  he  enjoined  them,  saying,  'Take  heed,  beware  of  the  leaven 

16  of  the  Pharisees,  and  of  the  leaven  of  Herod.'     And  they  argued 

17  with  one  another,  'We  have  no  bread.'  And  Jesus  perceived  it, 
and  said  unto  them,  'Why  do  ye  argue  that  ye  have  no  bread? 
do  ye  not  yet  perceive  or  understand  ?   is  your  heart  hardened  ? 

18  Having  eyes,  see  ye  not?  and  having  ears,  hear  ye  not?   and  do 


J  J 


VIII.  I3-2I]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  189 

19  ye  not  remember  ?    When  I  broke  the  five  loaves  among  the  five 
thousand,  how  many  baskets  full  of  fragments  took  ye  up  ? '     And 

20  they  said, '  Twelve.'     '  And  when  the  seven  loaves  among  the  four 
thousand,  how  many  baskets   full  of  fragments  took  ye  up?' 

21  And  they  said, '  Seven,'     And  he  said  unto  them, '  Do  ye  still  not 
understand  ? ' 

W.  remarks  that  13  or  rather  9,  which  13  resumes  and  repeats, 
must  originally  have  been  followed  by  22.  The  redactor  having 
now  two  feeding  stories  in  his  narratives  is  able  to  reflect  about 
them  both  in  14-21. 

15.  W.  thinks  that  this  verse  has  no  connection  with  14, 
16-21.  An  isolated  saying  of  Jesus  is  given  a  wrong  place  and 
connection.  For  the  '  leaven '  is  not  the  teaching  of  the  Pharisees 
or  of  Herod,  but  their  evil  disposition.  They  are  united  in  their 
hatred  of  Jesus.  The  disciples  are  to  beware  of  their  hostility  and 
guile,  not  of  being  infected  by  their  teaching. 

For  the  Rabbinic  use  of  the  word  'leaven,'  see  Additional 
Note  17. 

Certainly  the  omission  of  1 5  makes  the  connexion  and  sense 
much  more  natural.  16  follows  well  on  14,  though,  it  must  be 
admitted,  only  if  we  may  render,  like  W. :  '  Und  sie  machten  sich 
Gedanken  dariiber,  dass  sie  kein  Brot  hatten.'  But  is  this  transla- 
tion possible  ?  It  is,  however,  adopted  by  Klostermann.  The 
usual  interpretation  of  the  words  in  16  is  that  they  discussed  with 
each  other  what  the  warning  of  Jesus  (in  15)  precisely  signified, 
and  that  they  took  it  to  refer  to  their  neglect  to  take  enough 
bread  with  them — a  strained  meaning,  as  must  be  admitted,  but 
not  out  of  accordance  with  the  general  theory  of  Mark  as  to  the 
spiritual  blindness  of  the  apostles. 

Jesus's  rebuke  seems  at  first  sight  to  mean  that  the  disciples  are 
never  to  have  a  fear  of  material  wants.  By  his  miraculous  powers 
Jesus,  if  they  have  faith,  will  always  provide  for  them  in  every 
emergency.  So  Matthew  understands  the  passage.  The  obtuse- 
ness  of  the  disciples  is  awkwardly  exaggerated.  They  do  not  even 
remember  the  surprising  miracles  of  the  feeding  the  5000  and  the 
4000.  But  this  explanation  is  clearly  inadequate.  There  must  prob- 
ably be  more  in  the  rebuke  than  a  mere  reference  to  the  miracles 
as  outward  events.  More  is  intended  than  the  mere  injunction 
not  to  fear  material  want  because  Jesus  can  always,  if  need  be, 
through  his  miraculous  powers,  provide  the  necessary  food.  There 
is  a  spiritual  reference  as  well.  Hence  there  seems  more  reason 
to  accept  the  explanation  of  Loisy.    He  too  holds  that  15  contains 


190  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  13-21 

a  historic  saying  of  Jesus,  but  unlike  W.,  he  regards  this  saying 
as  the  source  round  which  14-21  has  been  formed.  Moreover  he 
interprets  the  saying,  not  as  W.  does,  but  spiritually.  He,  however, 
holds  that  Jesus  only  spoke  of  the  leaven  of  the  Pharisees,  meaning 
by  that  their  false  piety,  and  not  also  of  the  leaven  of  Herod.  (If 
he  had  spoken  also  of  the  leaven  of  Herod,  then  W.'s  interpretation 
would  be  necessary.  The  interpolator  who  added  '  the  leaven  of 
Herod '  meant  by  it  the  false,  irreligious,  mundane,  spirit  of  Herod.) 
The  Evangelist  or  the  redactor  invented  the  forgotten  loaves 
to  make  a  connection  for  the  saying  about  the  'leaven.'  The 
disciples  are  then  made  to  misunderstand  this  saying,  and  Jesus  in 
his  reply  hints  that  the  miracles  of  the  loaves  had  a  spiritual  and 
symbolic  meaning.  The  saying  about  the  'leaven'  was  meant 
spiritually.  The  miracles  of  the  loaves,  though  true  in  fact,  were 
also — so  the  redactor  would  inform  us — meant  symbolically.  He 
perhaps  would  even  have  given  a  symbolic  meaning  to  the 
forgotten  food  (in  verse  14),  namely,  the  inadequacy  of  the  ancient 
apostles  to  bring  about  the  expansion  of  Christianity.  The 
multiplied  loaves  is  a  symbol  of  the  salvation  offered  to  the  Jews 
and  the  Gentiles.  And  the  intense  stupidity  of  the  apostles  is 
once  more  shown  to  be  '  a  thesis  of  the  Evangelist,  rather  than  a 
fact  of  history.'  It  nevertheless  symbolizes  a  reality,  namely,  that 
the  disciples  during  the  lifetime  of  Jesus  never  suspected  certain 
facts  which  afterwards  became  apparent,  i.e.  the  universal  destina- 
tion of  the  gospel,  the  abrogation  of  the  Law,  the  institution  of  a 
new  community  of  which  Jesus  was  the  centre,  and  of  which  the 
breaking  of  bread  was  to  be  both  the  symbol  and  the  bond.  Thus 
Loisy  urges  that  Mark  adds  to  the  most  ancient  traditions,  already 
partly  written,  considerations  inspired  by  Pauline  universalism  and 
by  the  later  developments  of  Christianity.  The  verses  which  g;ive 
15  its  setting  are  written  from  the  same  point  of  view  as  those 
which  give  the  explanation  of  the  parable  of  the  sower  and  the 
explanation  of  the  saying  of  the  true  defilement.  And  note  that 
the  language  recalls  previously  used  expressions.  Gp.  iv.  12,  vi.  52, 
vii.  18.  Verse  18  is  modelled  on  Jeremiah  v.  21  and  Ezekiel  xii.  2 
{E.  S.  I.  pp.  1001-1006). 


22-26.    A  Blind  Man  Healed 
(Mark  only) 

22  And  they  came  to  Bethsaida ;  and  they  brought  a  blind  man 

23  unto  him,  and  besought  him  to  touch  him.     And  he  took  the 
blind  man  by  the  hand,  and  led  him  out  of  the  village ;  and  he 


yill.  22-26]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  igi 

spat  into  his  eyes,  and  put  his  hands  upon  him,  and  asked  him  if 
34  he  saw  anything.     And  he  looked  up,  and  said, '  I  perceive  men, 

25  for  I  see  them  like  trees,  walking.'     Then  Jesus  put  his  hands 
again  upon  his  eyes,  and  he  looked  steadfastly,  and  was  restored, 

26  and  saw  everything  clearly.     And  he  sent  him  away  to  his  house, 
saying, '  Go  not  into  the  village.' 

Here,  finally,  is  the  variant  to  vii.  31-37.  If  we  do  not  accept 
the  view  of  W.  given  at  the  opening  of  the  chapter,  the  question 
presents  itself,  why  did  the  redactor  add  on  and  insert  this 
'  variant '  ?  Was  it  merely  that  finding  it,  and  thinking  it  to  be 
an  extra,  independent,  fresh  instance  of  the  miraculous  powers  of 
Jesus,  and  not  wishing  that  such  an  instance  should  be  forgotten, 
he  was  anxious  to  secure  a  place  for  it  in  the  Gospel  ?  But  its  place 
near  the  second  miracle  of  the  loaves  makes  it  possible  that  Loisy 
is  right  in  seeing  in  the  redactor's  motive  a  more  symbolic  intention. 
'  La  gu^rison  de  I'aveugle  parait  figurer  I'adh^sion  des  apotres  k  la 
foi  messianique,  tout  comme  la  guerison  du  sourd-muet  figure  la 
conversion  des  gentils,  et  I'origine  de  I'^^glise  hell6nochr6tienne.' 
And  is  the  miracle  inserted  in  this  special  place  before  the  confes- 
sion of  Peter,  to  symbolize  and  prepare  the  way  for  that  dissipation 
of  spiritual  darkness  in  the  apostles  which  the  confession  is  to 
reveal?  (E.  S.  I.  pp.  1007,  1008).  It  is  noticeable  that  both 
variants  are  unused  by  Matthew.  He  objected,  W.  thinks,  to  the 
magical  method  of  healing.  It  seemed  to  him  unworthy  of  the 
Master. 

J.  Weiss,  as  in  vii.  31-37,  thinks  the  story  is  suspicious 
and  secondary.  The  minutely  described  procedure  makes  the 
narrative  no  more  credible.  '  A  semblance  of  naturalness  is  given 
to  the  miracle  of  almighty  power  by  this  exact  description;  it 
almost  appears  as  if  the  cure  was  only  started  by  the  touching  and 
the  spitting,  and  then  completed  itself.  But  our  confidence  in  the 
report  is  not  thereby  strengthened  in  the  least.  For  these  details 
do  not  make  the  sudden  cure  of  ever  such  a  mild  disease  of  the 
eyes  any  clearer ;  they  only  betray  to  us  that  the  narrator,  in  spite 
of  all  his  belief  in  miracles,  is  already  beginning  to  reflect  how  it 
was  possible  for  Jesus  to  perform  such  an  act.  And  it  is  a  very 
simple-minded  explanation  of  the  miracle  that  the  power  of  Jesus 
was  successful,  not,  it  is  true,  the  first  time,  but  still  the  second.' 


192  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 


viil  27-ix.  I.    Jesus  the  Suffering  Messiah — 
Peter  and  Jesus 

{Op.  Matt,  xvl  13-28;  Luke  ix.  18-27) 

27  And  from  there  Jesus  went,  with  his  disciples,  into  the 
villages  of  Csesarea  PhiUppi:  and  on  the  way  he  asked  his 
disciples,  saying  unto  them,  'Whom  do  men  say  that  I  am?' 

28  And    they  answered,  '  John  the   Baptist ;    and   others,   Elijah ; 

29  and  others,  One  of  the  prophets.'  And  he  asked  them,  'But 
ye — whom  say  ye  that  I  am  ? '    And  Peter  answered  and  said 

30  unto  him,  'Thou  art  the  Messiah.'  And  he  sternly  admonished 
them  that  they  should  tell  no  man  of  him. 

31  And  he  began  to  teach  them  that  the  Son  of  man  must 
suffer  much,  and  be  rejected  by  the  Elders  and  the  chief  priests 
and  the  scribes,  and  be  killed,  and  after  three  days  rise  again. 

32  And  he  spoke  the  word  quite  openly. 

33  And  Peter  took  him  aside,  and  began  to  rebuke  him.  But 
he  turned  round,  and  looking  on  his  disciples,  he  rebuked  Peter, 
saying, '  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan :   for  thou  thinkest  not  the 

34  thoughts  of  God,  but  of  men.'  And  he  called  the  people  unto 
him  together  with  his  disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  'Whoever 
would  follow  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself,  and  take  up  his 

35  cross,  and  follow  me.  For  whoever  would  save  his  life  shall 
lose  it;    but  whoever  would  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  and  the 

36  gospel's,   he   shall   save   it.     For  what   can   it   profit  a  man  to 

37  gain   the   whole   world,  and  to  forfeit  his  life  ?    For  what  can 

38  a  man  give  as  the  price  of  his  life  ?  For  whoever  shall  be 
ashamed  of  me  and  of  my  words  in  this  adulterous  and  sinful 
generation,  of  him  also  shall  the  Son  of  man  be  ashamed,  when  he 

IX.  I  Cometh  in  the  glory  of  his  Father  with  the  holy  angels.'  And  he 
said  unto  them, '  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  There  are  some  of  those 
who  stand  here  who  shall  not  taste  death  till  they  see  the 
kingdom  of  God  come  with  power.' 

Here  begins  a  new  section  of  the  Gospel  of  the  greatest  import- 
ance and  significance.  W.  calls  viii.  27-x.  the  second  portion  of  the 
second  main  division  of  Mark.     He  entitles  it :  '  Jesus  on  the  way 


.i.i.j 


VIII.  27-IX.  I]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  193 

to  Jerusalem,'  It  is,  however,  doubtful  whether  these  divisions 
and  sub-divisions  represent  the  intention  or  mind  of  the  Evangelist. 
M.  Loisy  thinks  that  the  confession  of  Peter  does  not  to  Mark 
form  'an  essential  division'  of  his  book,  though  it  must  have 
formed  'un  point  capital'  in  the  source  from  which  the  confession 
was  taken.  Moreover  the  correspondence  of  the  blind  man  in 
viii.  22-26  with  the  blind  man  of  x.  46-52  indicates  a  sort  of 
'  sectionnement '  in  vi.  30-x.  (which  Loisy  calls  roughly  the  fourth 
part  of  the  book)  that  would  allow  one  to  put  a  break  at  viii.  26, 
and  treat  viii.  27-x.  as  a  separate  section  (E.  >Si.  I.  p.  85,  n.  i).  We 
may  also  notice,  with  W.,  the  curious  parallelism  between  the 
opening  of  vi.  14-16  (with  which  W.  begins  his  second  division) 
and  viii.  27  seq.  In  both  cases  the  question  is  discussed  who 
Jesus  really  is. 

'Now  only,'  as  W.  says,  'begins  the  gospel  as  the  apostles 
proclaimed  it ;  before  this  one  does  not  perceive  much  of  it.  The 
determination  to  go  to  Jerusalem  causes  a  remarkable  change.  A 
transfigured  Jesus  stands  before  us,  and  the  two  miracles  of 
healing,  which  are  inserted,  seem  almost  out  of  place.  He  no 
longer  teaches  general  doctrine,  but  prophesies  about  himself. 
He  speaks  to  his  disciples  rather  than  to  the  people.  To  them  he 
reveals  his  nature  and  mission.  But  he  does  this  esoterically. 
They  are  not  to  tell  it  to  anyone  till  the  predictions  are  fulfilled, 
and  even  they  themselves  do  not  till  then  understand  it.  The 
opportunity  to  reveal  the  secret  is  given  by  the  confession  of 
Peter,  "Thou  art  the  Messiah."  Jesus  induced  that  confession, 
and  he  accepts  it  with  a  correction ;  he  is  not  the  Messiah  who  is 
to  restore  the  kingdom  of  Israel,  but  quite  another  Messiah.  He 
does  not  go  to  Jerusalem  to  restore  the  Jewish  kingdom,  but  to  be 
crucified.  Through  suffering  and  death  he  enters  into  glory,  and 
only  thus — through  this  same  path — can  others  follow  him  thither. 
The  Kingdom  of  God  is  no  Jewish  kingdom ;  it  is  only  intended 
for  certain  chosen  individuals,  his  disciples.  The  idea  of  the 
possibility  of  a  general  repentance  of  the  whole  people  is  entirely 
abandoned.  Instead  of  a  summons  to  repentance  addressed  to 
all,  we  have  the  demand,  "Follow  me,"  the  demand  of  discipleship, 
which  only  very  few  can  fulfil.  And  the  conception  of  discipleship 
itself  assumes  a  new  and  higher  meaning.  It  no  longer  merely 
implies  following  and  accompanying  Jesus  in  his  lifetime,  but, 
mainly,  following  him  in  his  death,  Discipleship  as  imitation  is 
possible  even  after  his  death,  and,  indeed,  it  only  then  properly 
begins.  His  cross  is  to  be  carried  after  him.  For  the  Kingdom's 
sake  the  disciples  are  to  abandon  people  and  family;  they  must 
sacrifice  everything  which  binds  them  to  life ;  they  must  sacrifice 
life  itsell     Reform  is  impossible ;  the  enmity  of  the  world  cannot 

M.  13 


194  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-lX.  i 

be  overcome.  A  violent  breach  with  the  world  is  demanded, 
leading  to  martyrdom.  Thus  the  situation  and  the  mood  of  the 
early  Christian  community  is  here  reflected  beforehand  in  Jesus, 
as  he  goes  forward  to  meet  his  fate.  Upon  this  depends  that 
lofty  pathos  in  which  the  introduction  to  the  Passion  excels  the 
Passion  itself.' 

Clearly,  therefore,  if  W.  is  right,  there  is  a  good  deal  of 
prospective  history  in  this  section,  and  less  of  historical  record. 

For  Jesus  seems  to  project  himself  not  only  into  his  own 
future,  but  also  into  the  future  of  his  community.  His  disciples, 
the  members  of  that  community,  are  threatened  with  persecutions ; 
martyrdoms  are  hinted  at;  the  sons  of  Zebedee  are  to  suffer  a 
similar  fate  to  that  of  their  Master,  yet  they  are  not  necessarily 
to  hold  a  higher  rank  in  the  future  Kingdom  of  God.  The  general 
hope  is  narrowed.  Only  those  who  believe  in  Jesus  and  follow  him 
may  confidently  expect  to  enter  the  Kingdom.  The  commands  of 
the  Law,  as  given  to  the  Jews,  are  inadequate  (W.  presses  x.  21 
and  29).  To  his  followers,  and  not  to  the  general  public,  Jesus 
now  addresses  himself.  They  are  told  of  the  fate  which  lies  before 
him,  and  are  enjoined  to  be  ready  to  follow  in  the  same  dark  path. 

Whether  the  confession  of  Peter  had  actually  the  epoch-making 
importance  which  Mark  assigns  to  it  is  a  question  to  which  no 
final  answer  can  ever  be  given.  If  Mark  viii.  28  is  accurate,  Jesus 
had  till  then  {i.e.  for  the  greater  part  of  his  ministry)  neither 
himself  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  nor  had  others,  outside  his 
chosen  disciples,  thought  that  he  was  so.  And  this  is  probably 
correct.  Dr  Martineau,  on  the  other  hand,  thinks  that  the  historic 
reality  which  verse  30  half  conceals  and  half  reveals  was  that 
Jesus,  when  Peter  said  '  Thou  art  the  Messiah,'  disclaimed  and 
disavowed  the  title  and  office.  He  was  not  the  Messiah.  This 
seems  a  very  hazardous  interpretation  of  the  verse.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  Jesus  had  neither  claimed  nor  been  thought  to  be  the 
Messiah  till  the  scene  at  Caesarea  Philippi,  it  is  not  quite  easy  to 
understand  how  so  very  soon  after  we  can  account  for  the  wording 
of  X.  47,  or,  still  more,  for  an  event  like  that  recorded  in  xi  lO, 
where  Jesus  is  openly  hailed  as  Messiah.  Is  the  explanation 
adequate  that,  in  spite  of  his  earnest  prohibition,  the  disciples  now 
began  to  talk  of  his  Messiahship,  and  so  made  the  rumour  of  the 
coming  Messiah  pass  quickly  on  to  Jericho  and  Jerusalem  ?  One 
may,  of  course,  argue  that  the  wording  ('  son  of  David ')  in  x.  47 
is  not  to  be  relied  on,  and  that  xi.  10  is  not  historical  or  that 
it  has  been  '  Messianically '  coloured. 

The  degree  of  importance  which  attaches  to  the  question 
whether  Jesus  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  and  to  his  admission  of 
his  Messiahship  at  Caesarea  Philippi,  is  also  influenced  by  the 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  195 

possibility  that,  as  W.  says,  Jesus  accepted  the  name  of  the  Jewish 
ideal,  but  altered  its  contents.  But  the  uncertainties  of  the  subject 
are  reflected  in  what  W,  then  proceeds  to  add :  '  Jesus  would  not 
lose  in  importance  for  us,  even  if  he  did  not  do  this,  but  only  gave 
himself  out  as  the  fulfiller  of  the  Old  Testament.  I  moreover 
admit,  first,  that  he  had  an  outward  cause  to  leave  Galilee  (see 
vi.  30-33),  and  that  he  did  not  go  to  Jerusalem  with  the  mere 
intention  of  being  crucified  there ;  secondly,  that  the  predictions 
about  the  Passion,  in  which  the  subject  is  the  Son  of  man,  are 
open  to  the  suspicion  of  a  later  date;  thirdly,  that  it  remains 
unclear  whether  in  Jerusalem  Jesus  himself  openly  appeared  as 
the  Messiah,  or  whether  he  was  only  taken  to  be  the  Messiah  by 
the  people,  and  therefore  accused  by  the  authorities  before  Pilate.' 
The  conclusions  of  W.  may  need  some  modification  if  we  hold 
that  the  confession  of  Peter,  with  the  promise  of  the  near  Parousia 
and  the  remarks  about  Elijah,  were  taken  and  elaborated  by  Mark 
not  from  oral  tradition,  but  from  a  written  source.  This  is  Loisy's 
opinion  {E.  S.  I.  p.  1 14).  That  Q  contained  a '  Petrusbekenntniss'  is 
urged  by  B.Weiss,  but  his  arguments  do  not  seem  in  this  instance  of 
much  weight,  and  they  largely  depend  upon  unacceptable  views 
about  the  Son  of  man.  For  Loisy  the  source  is  not  Q,  but  the  narra- 
tive source,  which  he  assumes  as  Mark's  second  written  authority. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  are  verses  in  the  present  section  such 
as  viii.  35,  38  which  may,  as  will  be  seen,  depend  on  Q.  Whether, 
however,  because  they  were  in  Q,  the  quotations  from  W.  would 
be  invalidated  is  another  question.  It  does  not  necessarily  follow 
that  they  would.  Neither  in  Mark  nor  in  Q,  as  Bousset  reminds 
us,  can  we  be  sure  that  we  find  the  ipsissima  verba  of  Jesus. 
Both  Q  and  Mark,  the  former  as  well  as  the  latter,  may  often 
reflect  the  later  thoughts  of  the  community  as  it  attempted  to 
recall  and  record  the  words  of  the  Master,  crucified  and  in  glory. 
The  gigantic  fact  of  the  crucifixion,  and  what  was  believed  to 
have  happened  to  the  crucified  one  after  his  death,  involuntarily 
coloured  and  altered  a  good  deal  of  what  he  had  actually  said. 

27.  The  disciples  had  been  away  from  Jesus,  and  had  returned 
to  him  (vi.  30).  Both  during  their  absence  and  since  their  return 
they  had  had  opportunities  to  hear  what  was  said  of  him  by  the 
people  with  whom  they  came  in  contact.  Jesus  wishes,  therefore,  to 
know  whether  his  Messiahship  has  been  recognized.  This  seems  the 
more  obvious  meaning  of  the  question.  He  finds  out  that  though 
some  think  him  the  foreruimer,  he  is  not  supposed  to  be  the 
Messiah.  Then  Jesus  pushes  the  matter  further.  Do  the  disciples 
rest  content  with  the  opinions  of  others  ?  Have  they  guessed  no 
better  ?    Such  must  be  the  meaning  of  Mark  in  this  conversation. 

13 — 2 


196  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-lX.  i 

But  whether  Jesus  iatroduced  the  subject  in  this  manner  we  have 
no  means  of  knowing. 

28.  Gp.  vi.  14,  15.  'A  prophet';  that  is,  probably,  not  a 
prophet  risen  from  the  dead,  but  a  new  prophet  on  his  own 
account.  Luke,  on  the  other  hand,  understands  the  words  to 
mean  a  risen  prophet,  and  it  must  be  confessed  that  this  makes  a 
better  parallelism.  The  three  alternatives  are  precisely  the  same 
as  those  given  in  vi.  14-16. 

29.  Obviously,  if  Jesus  had  already  told  the  disciples  that  he 
was  the  Messiah,  the  question  would  have  had  no  meaning. 

30.  eiririfidai.  In  32  and  33  this  word  means 'rebuke.'  Here 
it  seems  to  mean  no  more  than  '  admonish.' 

Dr  Weymouth  renders:  'strictly  forbade.'  In  verse  32  he 
renders  the  same  verb  (eTriTi/jLav)  'remonstrate'  and  in  33 
'rebuke.'  A  good  deal  turns  on  this  verb.  J.  Weiss,  at  least, 
lays  great  stress  on  it.  He  thinks  it  must  have  the  same  meaning 
in  all  three  verses.  The  scene  at  Caesarea  Philippi  rests,  to  Weiss, 
upon  Peter's  '  reminiscences.'  Peter  '  remembered '  that  when  he 
had  told  Jesus  that  the  disciples  supposed  him  (Jesus)  to  be  the 
Messiah,  Jesus  instead  of  being  pleased  was  agitated.  'Er  herrschte 
sie  an.'  Why  was  this  ?  J.  Weiss  holds  that  the  reason  was  that 
Jesus  discerned  in  Peter's  '  gestures  and  tone '  something  which 
made  him  realize  that  the  disciples  had  not  advanced  beyond  the 
'Jewish'  conception  of  the  Messiah.  But  Jesus  knew  that,  if 
indeed  he  was  the  Messiah,  he  was  not  the  political  Messiah  who 
was  to  conquer  and  triumph.  If  he  was  the  Messiah,  he  was 
rather  Daniel's  heavenly  'Man,'  who  was  at  last  to  come  down 
from  heaven  upon  clouds.  And  in  any  case  a  heavy  fate  lay  first 
in  store  for  him.  For  he  must  suffer  and  die ;  and  this  it  is  which 
the  disciples  have  to  be  told.  The  confession  of  Peter  is  a  mere 
introduction  to  that  which  is  to  follow.  The  theory  of  J.  Weiss  is 
ingenious,  but  hardly  convincing;  yet  surely  it  is  improper  to 
speak  of  it  or  of  similar  theories,  as  Merx  does,  as  an  '  unwiirdige 
Albemheit  fur  Kinder.'  Klostermann  holds  that  the  '  rebuke,'  or 
'  admonishment,'  is  only  relative  to  the  order  of  silence.  Jesus 
accepts  the  title  of  Messiah,  but  it  is  not  to  pass  beyond  the  inner 
circle  of  the  disciples.  At  the  same  time  he  gives  it  a  new  content 
by  what  immediately  follows.  His  active  Messiahship  must  be 
preceded  by  suffering  and  death. 

The  disciples,  then,  from  this  time  forth  are  to  know  that  Jesus 
is  the  Messiah,  but  the  people  are  still  to  be  in  ignorance  of  it. 
Those  who  deny  that  Jesus  ever  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah  have 
to  suppose  that  the  verse  means  that  Jesus  forbade  the  disciples  to 


JjIjIjIjIJj 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  197 

speak  of  his  Messiahship  because  it  was  untrue ;  he  was  not  the 
Messiah.  Thus  Schmidt  {Prophet  of  Nazareth,  p.  277) :  '  Jesus 
charged  his  disciples  not  to  say  that  he  was  the  Messiah.  He 
did  not  wish  that  men  should  believe  in  him  as  the  Messiah  and 
confess  him  as  such.'  But  then,  if  the  language  attributed  to 
Jesus  is  what  he  really  said,  one  wonders  that  he  was  not  more 
definite.  Rather  than  charging  his  disciples  not  to  say  he  was 
the  Messiah,  it  would  have  been  simpler  and  clearer  to  have 
charged  them  to  say  that  he  was  not  the  Messiah. 

Why  did  Jesus  not  wish  to  be  known  as  the  Messiah?  If 
he  knew  he  was  the  Messiah,  why  should  he  not  have  said  so 
openly,  in  order  that  all  might  have  had  the  better  chance  of 
believing  in  him  and  in  his  message?  Is  there  something  in 
Dr  Martineau's  argument  that  'the  injunction  to  conceal  the  claim 
is  inconsistent  with  his  having  made  or  sanctioned  it,'  that  'to 
keep  it  out  of  sight,  not  to  press  it  passionately  and  always  upon 
the  nation  at  an  hour  so  critical,  were  simple  betrayal  of  the 
divinest  trust'  (Seat  of  Authority  in  Religion,  5th  ed.,  p.  386)? 
Or  may  we  not  argue,  as  the  evidence  that  Jesus  claimed  to  be 
the  Messiah  is  too  great  to  be  avoided,  that  the  unhistorical  part 
of  the  matter  is  the  injunction  to  silence  and  to  secrecy  ?  Are 
not  these  rather  due  to  Mark's  theory  than  to  history  ?  Or  may 
we  assume  that  the  order  to  keep  silence  is  historical,  but  the 
reason  not  the  one  which  Mark  would  have  us  suppose  ?  May  it 
not  well  be  that  Jesus  knew  the  imminent  danger  which  a  pro- 
clamation and  acknowledgment  of  his  Messiahship  would  involve  ? 
He  was  determined  at  whatever  risk  to  proclaim  his  Messiahship 
at  Jerusalem,  but  he  would  not  do  so  before.  Or  perhaps  he 
thought  that  God  Himself  by  some  sudden  act  would  reveal  it, 
and  that  he  must  not  anticipate  the  divine  revelation.  In  that 
last  case  the  Messianic  entry  must  be  regarded  as  unhistorical. 

I  have  already  alluded  to  the  favourite  theory  that  Jesus 
believed  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  but  in  quite  a  new  sense. 
He  was  a  purely  religious  Messiah,  who  would  have  nothing  to 
do  with  politics.  He  would  not  restore  the  Jewish  kingdom. 
He  was  the  Messiah  in  the  sense  that  he  was  about  to  introduce 
the  Kingdom  of  God.  By  his  new  teaching  a  certain  number 
of  persons  were  to  be  made  fit  for  that  Kingdom,  while  those 
who  rejected  him  were  to  be  excluded.  Or,  again,  it  is  argued 
that  he  felt  himself  to  be  the  servant-Messiah  of  Isaiah  xlii.  and 
liii.  Only  after  suffering  and  death  would  his  true  Messiahship 
begin. 

The  Kingdom  of  God  was  intended  for  the  Jews.  It  is  ac- 
knowledged by  W.  and  other  great  commentators  that  Jesus  did 
not  look  beyond  the   limits  of  the  Jews  in  his  ministry  and 


198  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

teaching.  The  Kingdom  is  for  Jewish  believers.  It  is  to  cor- 
respond with  the  old  Jewish  Messianic  age.  But  what  part  the 
Gentiles,  and  especially  the  Romans,  are  to  play  in  that  age  is 
not  stated.  Here  the  commentators  in  their  interpretations  of 
Jesus's  mind  seem  to  fail  us.  All  they  emphasise  and  reiterate 
is  that  Jesus's  Messiahship  and  Messianic  age  had  nothing  to  do 
with  the  '  impure '  political  aspirations  of  the  Jews.  Jesus,  then, 
does  not  desire  to  be  known  as  the  Messiah,  so  that  the  people 
may  not  think  that  their  hopes  are  to  be  fulfilled  and  the  yoke 
of  the  Romans  shaken  off.  But  if  Jesus  believed  himself  to  be 
the  Messiah  in  this  new  sense,  why  did  he  not  say  so  plainly? 
Whatever  some  might  think,  or  whatever  he  might  think  of  the  Son 
of  man  and  his  coming,  it  is  certain  that  the  bulk  of  the  people 
connected  the  Messiah  with  political  independence,  with  a  con- 
dition of  liberty,  righteousness,  and  prosperity.  So  much,  at  any 
rate,  was  still  adhered  to  in  the  predictions  of  the  prophets  and 
in  their  delineations  of  the  Messiah.  If  Jesus  believed  that  this 
Messiah  of  the  prophets  was  'impure'  and  false — that  this  Messiah 
would  never  appear — why  did  he  not  say  so  ?  Why  did  he  dally 
with  the  Messianic  idea  at  all  and  permit  others  to  dally  with  it  ? 
Why,  if  we  follow  up  J.  Weiss's  arguments,  did  he  not  separate 
off  the  Son  of  man  idea  more  clearly  from  the  Messiah  idea  ?  He 
might  be  a  far  higher  person  than  the  Jewish  Messiah  ;  he  might 
even  be  the  Son  of  God  in  a  special  sense ;  but  why  did  he  claim 
and  believe  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  or  at  any  rate  allow 
himself  to  be  called  so  by  Peter,  if  he  did  not  fulfil  the  ordinary 
conditions,  nay,  if  those  very  conditions  were  '  impure,'  political, 
and  never  to  be  fulfilled  ? 

We  have  seen  that  the  clearest  picture  of  the  old  prophetical 
Messiah  in  the  Old  Testament  is  Isaiah  xi.  But  if  the  com- 
mentators are  right,  the  prediction  of  Isaiah  xi.  is  '  impure '  and 
'political.'  Moreover,  it  will  never  be  fulfilled,  and  Jesus  never 
intended  to  fulfil  it.  One  cannot  help  wondering  what  Jesus 
thought  his  own  relation  was  to  the  Messiah  described  by  Isaiah, 
or  whether  he  definitely  thought  that  Isaiah  was  wrong?  Was 
there  only  to  be  a  Messiah,  like  the  servant  in  Isaiah  xlii.  and 
liii.,  who  would  suffer  and  die,  and  come  again,  and  inaugurate 
a  purely  spiritual  kingdom  ?  Even  so,  the  Romans  were  surely 
not  to  be  the  rulers  in  the  new  age  after  the  Parousia  and  the 
Judgment.  But,  in  that  case,  was  there  not  a  political  element 
in  the  expectations  of  Jesus  after  all  ? 

Or  did  Jesus,  for  that  very  reason,  make  no  claim  to  be  the 
Messiah  ?  Did  he  rebuke  Peter  for  suggesting  that  he  was  the 
Messiah  ?  And  if  so,  did  he  believe,  though  he  was  not  the  Messiah, 
that,  nevertheless,  the  true  Messiah  would  ultimately  come  ? 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCOKDING  TO  MARK  1 99 

Some  great  commentators  have  thought  so,  and  the  idea  would 
explain  many  difficulties,  but  it  would  also  create  fresh  ones.  The 
whole  story  and  fate  of  Jesus  are  difficult  to  understand  if  in  some 
sense  or  other  he  did  not  claim  to  be  o  Messiah,  or  the  Messiah,  a 
king,  or  the  king,  of  the  Jews. 

Dr  Carpenter  remarks  here  that  it  is  a  curious  testimony  to 
the  ingenuousness  of  the  records  that  it  is  possible  to  ask  so  many 
questions  of  them.  If  they  were  the  result  of  reflective  imagination, 
there  would  be  answers,  or  suggestions  of  answers.  No  one  is  in 
any  doubt  as  to  the  view  of  Rome  and  its  fate  in  the  Book  of 
Revelation.  As  it  is,  one  is  wholly  without  clue  to  Jesus's  politics. 
In  fact,  one  cannot  say  that  he  had  any ;  the  interruption  of  the 
world-order  by  a  great  divine  display  is  not  a  political  conception, 
though  it  may  destroy  an  empire.  Thus  on  general  principles  it 
is  doubtless  right  to  say  that  there  would  be  no  Roman  suzerainty 
in  the  new  age.  But  this  is  not  so  much  a  political  as  a  religious 
expectation.  The  overthrow  of  the  Roman  power  would  be  by 
some  dramatic  coup  from  heaven.  There  is  no  question  of  revolt, 
or  organised  effiirt,  in  the  sphere  of  politics.  [I  may  mention  that 
this  'dramatic  coup  from  heaven'  is  the  prevailing  idea  of  the 
Rabbis  in  the  Talmud  as  to  the  coming  of  the  new  age.] 

Pfleiderer  thinks  that  Jesus  must  have  regarded  himself  as  the 
Messiah  in  a  theocratic  sense,  akin  to  the  ordinary  conceptions  of 
the  Messiah  current  among  his  disciples.  He  too  asks  why,  if 
Jesus  wanted  or  claimed  to  be  a  new  spiritual  Messiah,  did  he  not 
give  a  clear  explanation  to  his  disciples  ?  Why  did  he  accept  the 
popular  ovations  at  his  entry  into  Jerusalem  ?  (Vol.  I.  pp.  662, 
663.)  Pfleiderer  conjectures  that  Jesus  was  beginning  to  think 
seriously  that  he  was  or  might  be  the  prophesied  Messiah  at  the 
time  of  the  episode  at  Csesarea  Philippi.  Yet,  when  Peter  hails 
him  definitely  as  Messiah,  he  is  frightened  and  astounded.  Hence 
his  command  of  silence.  On  the  journey  to  Jerusalem  he  becomes 
more  and  more  familiar  with  the  idea ;  he  no  longer  prevents  his 
Messianic  vocation  being  known ;  at  Jerusalem  his  words  and 
actions  all  point  in  the  same  direction.  It  is  obvious  that  all 
these  theories  are  more  or  less  conjectural.  Pfleiderer  himself 
allows  that  none  can  tell  whether  Jesus  even  to  the  last  was 
wholly  convinced  of  his  Messiahship.  To  me  his  conviction  seems 
more  likely  than  his  uncertainty.  In  any  case  the  whole  history 
of  his  later  days  seems  unintelligible  unless  he  sanctioned  and 
countenanced  the  Messianic  beliefs  about  him  of  his  immediate 
followers.  And  he  would  not  have  sanctioned  them  unless  he  had 
shared  them. 

Dr  Carpenter  describes  the  growth  of  the  Messianic  conscious- 
ness of  Jesus,  as  we  find  it  delineated  in  Mark,  in  the  following 


200  THE  SyNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  1 

words:  'The  preacher  who  begins  by  announcing  that  the  Kingdom 
of  God  is  at  hand  is  forced  by  degrees  to  consider  his  relation  to  it. 
So  far  from  claiming  the  Messianic  function  at  the  opening  of  his 
career,  he  only  slowly  realizes  it ;  and  even  when  he  finally  accepts 
it,  he  resolutely  refuses  to  make  it  known.  This  represeutation 
appears  to  be  far  more  in  accordance  with  historical  probability — 
outward  and  inward — than  that  of  Matthew'  (in  whose  narrative 
Jesus  is  Messiah  to  himself  and  to  others  from  the  beginning  of 
his  ministry).  '  It  is  not  likely  that  Jesus  would  have  been  long 
allowed  to  proclaim  the  royal  dignity  which  the  assumption  of  the 
Messianic  character  involved  both  in  the  eyes  of  the  people  and 
of  their  Roman  over-lords.  Nor  does  it  seem  consistent  with  his 
early  teaching  about  the  Kingdom  that  he  should  have  taken  up 
at  the  outset  any  sort  of  official  connection  with  it.  The  title 
■which  he  at  length  accepted  was  rather  thrust  upon  him  by 
circumstance  than  deliberately  chosen.  It  was  adopted  with 
reluctance,  and  an  anxious  avoidance  of  publicity;  it  involved 
so  much  which  he  could  not  share ;  it  failed  to  express  so  much 
that  he  desired ;  yet  no  other  designation  spoke  in  the  same  way 
to  his  own  soul,  or  to  the  heart  of  his  time '  (First  Three  Gospels, 
p.  208).  Dr  Carpenter  has  a  wonderful  way  of  making  his  con- 
ception of  Jesus  intensely  plausible !  My  readers,  however,  will 
remember  the  dubious  and  meagre  evidence  for  several  of  the 
above  admirably  worded  sentences. 

Jiilicher  points  out  that  the  disciples  would  not  have  found 
the  death  of  Jesus  a  stumbling-block  had  they  not  believed  him 
to  be,  and  had  he  not  claimed  to  be,  the  Messiah ;  the  death  of  a 
prophet  was  not  fatal  to  the  truth  of  his  prophetic  inspiration. 
On  the  contrary.  Nor  could  the  belief  in  the  Messiahship  have 
arisen  from  a  void.  At  Csesarea  Philippi  Jesus,  according  to  Mark's 
story,  wanted  to  provoke  the  Messianic  confession  in  order  to  be 
able  to  explain  that  he  had  to  suffer,  die  and  rise  before  his 
Messianic  reign  would  begin,  and  that  therefore  nothing  must 
be  said  as  to  his  Messiahship  in  public.  Tradition  (reflected  in 
Mark)  busied  itself  to  establish  two  points  as  regards  the  life  of 
Jesus.  First,  to  show  that  his  miracles  and  prescience  proved  him 
to  have  been  the  Messiah ;  secondly,  to  show  why  his  Messiahship 
was  not  widely  known,  and  why  even  the  disciples  had  failed  to 
understand  him.  Jtilicher  thinks  that  there  is  historic  reality  at 
the  back  of  the  tradition.  Jesus  in  actual  fact  (not  having  the 
same  conception  of  the  Messiah  as  his  contemporaries)  did  not  want 
his  Messiahship  proclaimed  and  trumpeted  abroad,  and  he  did 
more  or  less  clearly  foresee  or  forefeet  the  likelihood  of  his  own 
violent  death  {Neue  Linien  in  der  Kritik  der  Evangelischm  Ueber- 
lieferung,  1906,  pp.  23-28). 


M-Aidiiiii 


VIII.  27-IX.  I J      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  20I 

31.  The  first  prediction  of  his  sufferings  or  Passion.  M.  Loisy 
holds  that  the  confession  of  Peter  is  historic  and  the  order  for 
silence  also.  The  announcement  of  suffering  and  death  and  resur- 
rection is  not.  The  true  sequel  of  30  is  ix.  i.  He  is  disposed 
to  agree  with  Schmiedel,  who  says  {E.  B.  11.  Col.  1 887) :  '  The 
confession  must  have  been  one  of  the  supreme  moments  in  the 
joyous  consciousness  of  Jesus — the  discovery  that  he  was  finding 
recognition  as  the  Messiah  and  winning  his  battle.  Suffering  and 
death  are  the  very  opposite  of  all  that  is  looked  for  in  the  Jewish 
Messiah,  and  what  Jesus  at  that  moment  could  have  looked  forward 
to  for  himself.'  The  reason  of  the  order  for  silence  was  because 
Jesus's  conception  of  the  Messiah  was  that  of  the  Messiah  in  his 
glory,  and  the  Messiah  in  glory  was  not  realized  in  him  while  he 
yet  preached  the  Kingdom.  He  had  a  short  preliminary  task 
to  fulfil,  before  the  Messiahship  could  be  announced  or  openly 
conferred  by  God.  Soon,  however,  he  would  show  himself  as 
Messiah  in  Jerusalem.  At  this  period  he  did  not  predict,  or  even 
foresee — so  I  gather  that  M.  Loisy  means — his  own  death.  '  Jesus 
n'allait  pas  a  Jerusalem  pour  y  mourir ;  il  y  allait  pour  preparer 
et  procurer,  au  risque  de  sa  vie,  I'avenement  de  Dieu.'  Even 
the  evening  before  his  death  he  does  not  do  more  than  (xiv.  25) 
.say  to  his  disciples  that  he  would  soon  be  with  them  in  the 
Kingdom:  he  announced  to  them  his  near  Coming,  in  spite  of 
death — if  he  must  undergo  it.  The  resuiTection  was  'sous- 
entendue'  in  the  hypothesis  of  death.  The  precise  predictions 
are  due  to  redaction  and  not  to  history  (E.  S.  Ii.  pp.  17-20, 
and  especially  i.  pp.  212-215). 

Bel,  '  must.'  What  was  the  '  must '  ?  In  the  eyes  of  the 
writer,  doubtless  because  the  divine  purpose  in  sending  Jesus  to 
earth  could  only  be  fulfilled  by  his  death. 

The  '  Elders  and  the  chief  priests '  represent  the  clerical  and 
lay  aristocracy  in  Jerusalem. 

'After  three  days,'  so  in  ix.  31,  x.  34.  In  Matthew  and  Luke, 
'  on  the  third  day,'  which  is  not  necessarily  the  same  thing.  The 
origin  of  '  the  third  day '  is  to  be  found  in  Hosea  vi.  2.  It  is  less 
easy  to  see  how  '  after  three  days '  can  be  accounted  for,  except  by 
the  Jonah  sign:  Jonah  i.  17,  Matt.  xii.  40.  The  two  different 
expressions  may  imply  variants  in  the  'schema'  of  the  resurrection 
(Loisy,  E.  S.  11.  p.  171)  or  they  may  mean  the  same  thing.  The 
first  and  third  day  need  not  be  taken  as  full  days.  In  order  to 
maintain  the  thesis  that  Jesus  predicted  his  resurrection,  but  did 
not  predict  anything  so  precise  as  when  it  would  exactly  happen, 
the  theory  has  been  suggested  that  'after  three  days'  means 
merely  'in  a  short  time,'  'soon  after  death,'  and  that  after  the 
event  the  phrase  was  altered  by  oral  tradition  to  '  on  the  third 


202  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

day.'  Hence  the  identity  of  Matthew  and  Luke  here  as  against 
Mark  (so  B.  Weiss,  Quellen,  A,  p.  39).  But  the  correspondence 
of  Matthew  and  Luke  may  be  explained  as  due  to  later  correction. 

Jesus  calls  himself  here,  not  the  Messiah  (he  never  uses  this 
title  of  himself),  but  the  Son  of  man.  On  any  critical  basis 
either  (a)  we  must  assume  that  the  prediction  has  been  greatly 
elaborated ;  at  the  outside,  Jesus,  at  this  crisis,  may  have  begun 
to  believe  that  his  end  would  be  death;  he  may  have  attained 
the  thought  that  this  death  was  God's  will,  and  that  he  must  not 
cease  from  his  teaching  in  order  to  escape  it ;  he  may  even  have 
come  to  believe  that  he  would  suffer  in  Jerusalem :  or  (6)  we  may 
hold  that  the  expectation  of  death  was  not  yet  present  to  his 
mind,  and  that  the  entire  verse  is  premature. 

If  JesQS  foretold  his  own  resurrection,  it  is  odd  that  the 
disciples  should  have  been  so  surprised  when  it  took  place,  or 
when  they  thought  that  it  took  place.  If  he  believed  that  he  was 
to  die  a  shameful  death,  why  did  he  say  on  the  cross,  '  My  God, 
why  hast  Thou  forsaken  me  ? ' 

Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  the  cry  on  the  cross  may  be  explained 
as  a  kind  of  final  confession  of  faith,  for  the  Psalm  contains  the 
most  triumphant  affirmation  that  the  Kingdom  is  the  Lord's 
(First  Three  Gospels,  p.  393). 

J.  Weiss  supposes  that  Jesus  did  anticipate  and  predict  his 
sufferings  and  death.  Why  should  he  not  have  foreseen  that  the 
bitter  opposition  of  the  Scribes,  the  fickleness  of  the  people,  the 
fears  of  the  authorities,  would  make  this  end  inevitable  ?  Some- 
times he  may  have  hoped  that  he  would  succeed  without  martyr- 
dom ;  even  at  Gethsemane  he  prays  that  this  may  be  possible ; 
but  usually  his  mood  and  conviction  are  different.  The  details  of 
his  Passion — these  have  been  filled  in  after  the  event — he  did  not 
foresee,  but  only  the  hard  necessity  of  ultimate  triumph  being 
prepared  and  made  way  for  by  suffering,  conflict,  and  death.  For 
through,  and  in  spite  of,  death  the  prophecy  of  Daniel  will  be 
fulfilled.  '  In  ihr  wird  irgendwie  auch  sein  Schicksal  beschlossen 
liegen.  Wie  es  sich  verwirklichen  soil,  das  wird  er  Gott  anheim- 
gestellt  haben.'  In  this  sense  Weiss  holds  both  the  prediction  of 
the  Passion  and  of  the  resurrection  to  be  historic.  '  Der  Wortlaut 
im  Einzelnen  gehort  der  Uberlieferimg  zu.'  An  attractive  theory, 
the  vagueness  of  which  (as  regards  Jesus's  view  of  his  precise 
relation  to,  or  identity  with,  the  '  Man '  of  Daniel)  is  perhaps  its 
best  recommendation.     But  still  only  a  theory. 

It  is  interesting  that  on  this  difficult  question  scholarship  has 
hardly  advanced  beyond  the  temperate  words  in  which  Strauss 
summed  it  up  over  seventy  years  ago.  '  If  Jesus  in  any  period  of 
his  life  thought  himself  to  be  the  Messiah,  as  to  which  there  can 


VIII.  27-IX.  I]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  203 

be  no  doubt,  and  if  he  called  himself  the  Son  of  man,  he  was 
bound,  it  would  seem,  to  expect  that  "  coming  on  the  clouds " 
which  was  predicted  of  the  Son  of  man  in  Daniel :  the  only- 
question  is  if  he  thought  of  this  as  a  transfiguration  {Verherr- 
lichung)  which  would  happen  during  his  life,  or  as  something 
which  would  only  befall  him  after  his  death.  According  to 
statements  like  Matt.  x.  23,  xvi.  28  [Mark  ix,  i],  one  might 
conjecture  the  prior  alternative ;  yet  it  is  always  possible  that  if, 
later  on,  his  death  seemed  certain  to  him,  his  conception  assumed 
the  latter  form,  from  which  point  of  view  Matt.  xxvi.  64  [Mark 
xiv.  62]  would  have  been  spoken'  (Das  Lehen  Jesu,  li.  p.  373 
first  ed.). 

32.  '  Openly.'  Most  commentators  say  this  means  '  clearly,' 
'  deliberately,'  to  all  the  disciples.  M.  Loisy  calls  this  chicanery. 
One  has,  he  thinks,  to  suppose  that  Mark  has  already  forgotten 
the  order  of  30,  that  the  crowd,  mentioned  in  34,  is  already 
assumed  to  be  present  here.  There  was  no  need  for  Peter  to 
take  Jesus  'aside,'  if  there  was  no  crowd.  The  other  disciples 
share  his  sentiments.  But  at  Csesarea  Philippi  there  was  no 
crowd.  The  disciples  were  alone  with  Jesus.  This  harsh  criticism 
of  the  current  explanation  of  'openly'  does  not  seem  quite  justified. 
Peter  at  any  rate  might  have  taken  Jesus  aside  in  order  not  to 
rebuke  his  Master  in  the  hearing  of  the  other  disciples. 

The  rebuke  of  Peter  because  he  did  not  realize,  as  Paul 
realized,  the  essential  importance  of  the  death  and  resurrection  of 
Christ  in  the  '  economy  of  salvation '  is,  Loisy  holds,  as  fictitious 
as  its  environment.  It  rests  upon  Mark's  theory  of  the  spiritual 
dulness  of  the  disciples.  '  The  Evangelist  has  not  only  introduced 
a  new  conception  alongside  of  the  story  of  the  acknowledgment 
of  the  Messiahship,  but  he  has  also  broken  the  connection  of  this 
story,  not  recollecting  that  Jesus  was  alone  with  his  disciples  near 
Cassarea  Philippi,  and  that  no  crowd  could  be  around  them  there. 
The  announcement  of  the  Passion  and  the  rebuke  of  Peter  are 
therefore  set  in  a  fictitious  framework :  the  rebuke  is  not  his- 
torically guaranteed  any  the  better  than  the  prediction  which 
occasioned  it,  or  than  the  framework  in  which  it  is  placed.  It 
is  connected  with  Mark's  thesis  of  the  mental  dulness  of  the 
apostles.  All  that  follows  the  Messianic  acknowledgment  (31-38) 
has  the  same  unreal  and  adventitious  character  which  marks  the 
previous  passages  where  the  same  idea  is  put  forward.  In  the 
source,  in  which  the  confession  of  Peter  was  first  narrated,  there 
was  no  announcement  of  the  Passion,  no  rebuke  of  Peter,  no 
speech  to  the  people,  but  very  probably  the  confession  was  followed 
by  the  saying  which  we  now  find  after  that  speech  (i.e.  ix.  i), 


204  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

wherein,  no  regard  being  paid  to  what  has  just  been  said  of  the 
Passion  and  the  resurrection,  the  near  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of 
God  is  foretold '  (E.  S.  Ii.  p.  20). 

For  what  did  Peter  rebuke  him  ?  It  would  seem  that  Peter  is 
appalled  at  the  revolutionary  idea  of  a  sufifering  and  dying  Messiah. 
He  wants  to  lead  Jesus  away  from  such  thoughts.  A  Messiah 
who  does  not  conquer,  but  is  himself  conquered,  who  does  not 
overcome  others,  but  is  himself  overcome,  is  to  him  a  monstrous 
impossibility,  a  contradiction  in  terms.  Away  with  the  thoughts 
and  conceptions  and  policy  which  could  make  the  Master's  career 
issue  in  such  a  shameful  end.  Thus  he  is  a  tempter,  like  the 
devil  in  Matt.  iv.  10.  W.  says  that  the  right  translation  is  not 
'  Get  thee  behind  me,'  but '  Away  from  me.* 

33.  ov  ^poveh  TO,  rov  deov,  &c.  A  Pauline  expression  (Romans 
viii.  S).  The  political  Messiah  is  human;  the  religious,  spiritual, 
suffering  and  dying  Messiah  is  divine.  It  is  a  noble  answer.  And 
yet,  as  we  have  seen,  and  shall  again  see,  it  is  not  easy  to  explain 
and  account  for  the  death  of  Jesus  unless  he  was,  at  any  rate, 
thought  to  be,  or  to  wish  to  be,  a  political,  theocratic  Messiah. 

34-38.  The  second  intercalation  between  30  and  ix.  i.  It 
contains  a  short  and  highly  important  lesson  on  renunciation  and 
the  conditions  of  discipleship.  But  though  it  is  intercalated,  as 
Loisy,  perhaps  justly,  supposes,  yet  Mark  may  very  probably  have 
drawn  some  of  its  material  from  Q.  For  Matthew  and  Luke 
reproduce  two  parallels  to  it.  Not  only  have  we  Matt.  xvi.  24,  25 
as  the  equivalent  of  Mark  viii.  34,  35,  but  we  have  also  Matt. 
X.  38,  39 ;  and  not  only  have  we  Luke  ix.  23,  24,  but  we  have  also 
Luke  xiv.  27  and  xvii.  33.  And  for  parallels  to  Mark  viii.  38  we 
have  Matt.  x.  33  and  Luke  xii.  9  as  well  as  Matt.  xvi.  27  and 
Luke  ix.  26.  And  many  scholars  hold  that  the  passages,  e.g.  in 
Matt.  X.  33  and  Luke  xvii.  33,  which  came  from  Q  are  more 
original  than,  and  are  the  direct  source  of,  their  parallels  in  Mark 
viii.  35  and  38.     See  further  the  notes  on  34,  35  and  38. 

34.  As  to  the  crowd  who  suddenly  appear  here,  cp.  the  note 
on  32.  It  may  indeed  be  argued  that  the  secret  of  the  Messiah- 
ship  (i.e.  that  Jesus  is  the  Messiah,  and  that  he  is  to  suffer  and 
die)  is  for  the  disciples  only,  but  that  the  lesson  of  renunciation  is 
for  all.  But  whence  the  crowd  came  is  unexplained.  Swefce 
says :  '  Even  in  the  villages  of  Csesarea  the  Lord  was  recognized 
and  followed  by  the  Jewish  population.'  This  makes  things 
rather  too  easy.  But  in  truth  Jesus  really  turns  away  from 
the  multitude  though  he  summons  them,  because  he  lays  down 
the  most  difficult  demands,  which  only  very  few  could  satisfy. 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  205 

J,  Weiss  thinks  that  'the  people'  were  added  mistakenly  by  a 
later  redactor,  who  perhaps  was  thinking  of  Luke  xiv,  25.  To 
avoid  tautology  W.  translates : 

'He  who  would  follow  me,  let  him  deny  himself  and  take  up 
his  cross;  so  will  he  follow  me.'  He  says  that  the  Aramaic 
original  of  kuI  aKoXovOelTto  /moi  would  justify  this,  certainly  more 
sensible,  rendering.  But  J.  Weiss  justifies  the  usual  view.  There 
is  a  kind  of  pun.  The  first  'follow'  means  merely  'be  my  disciple'; 
the  second  means  'follow  me  upon  my  road  of  suffering'  (cp.  Luke 
xiv.  27). 

'  Let  him  deny  himself  Self-renouncement  is  required ;  that 
is,  as  Gould  simply  puts  it,  the  disciple  'is  to  cease  to  make  himself 
the  object  of  his  life  and  action.' 

Jesus  says :  '  It  is  not  he  who  follows  me  in  life,  but  he  who 
follows  me  to  death,  who  is  my  disciple.'  In  Lam.  iii.  27  we  read : 
'  It  is  good  for  a  man  that  he  bear  the  yoke  in  his  youth.'  For 
the  yoke  we  here  have  '  the  cross.'  This  can  only  refer  to  Jesus's 
crucifixion ;  the  disciples  are  to  suffer  martyrdom  willingly.  This 
metaphorical  application  of  the  crucifixion,  which  has  not  yet 
happened,  is  most  peculiar  at  this  place  and  time,  for  it  must 
have  been  wholly  unintelligible  to  his  hearers.  The  cross  appears 
here  already  as  the  symbol  of  Christianity.  But  Jesus  has  not 
carried  it  for  all :  each  must  carry  it  after  him.  Gp.  x.  39,  '  the 
cup  which  I  drink,  ye  must  drink '  (W.).  The  section  from  34-38 
is  elaborated,  according  to  Loisy,  from  an  authentic  utterance  of 
Jesus  which  Mark  found  in  his  source — i.e.  Q,  or  the  'recueil 
des  discours' — and  placed  in  this  environment.  The  original 
'nidus'  of  the  speech  is  contained  (a)  in  the  saying,  'he  who 
would  save  his  life  must  lose  it,'  &c.,  and  (6)  in  the  witness  which 
Jesus  will  render  to  the  divine  Judge  as  to  those  who  denied  or 
acknowledged  him  (Matt.  x.  32)  (E.  S.  11.  p.  23).  The  second 
parallel  to  34  in  Matthew  is  x.  38  and  in  Luke  is  xiv.  27.  The 
question  is,  therefore,  whether  these  passages  came  from  Q  in  the 
form  in  which  we  now  read  them.  Of  course  B.  Weiss  ardently 
thinks  so  {Quellen,  A,  p.  144;  B,  p.  46).  In  that  case  the  allusion 
to  the  cross  was  also  in  Q.  Loisy  is  more  cautious.  '  Neither 
Matthew  nor  Luke  in  these  two  verses  have  a  primitive  colour. 
Perhaps  the  original  was :  "  If  any  wishes  to  follow  after  me,  let 
him  deny  himself."  Nevertheless,  Mark  viii.  34  may  have  been 
all  deduced  from  35.  And  34  may  have  influenced  Matt.  x.  38 
and  Luke  xiv.  17  either  directly  or  through  the  intermediary  of 
their  common  source '  (E.  S.  Ii.  p.  23,  n,  4).  So  complicated  are 
the  questions  raised  by  the  Gospels  ! 

35.    He  who  finds  martyrdom  in  this  life  will  live  again  in  the 


206  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

Kingdom.     He  who  avoids  martyrdom,  and  thus  saves  his  life  in 
this  world,  will  lose  it  in  the  next  world. 

The  passage  35-37  is  purely  eschatological.  It  does  not  mean 
that  to  gain  the  higher  life  we  must  forego  the  lower  life.  Nor 
do  any  of  the  parallels  in  the  Synoptics,  Matt.  x.  39,  xvi  25, 
Luke  ix.  24,  xvii.  33,  mean  this.  Perhaps  John  xii.  25  may  have 
this  signification,  but  the  Synoptic  passages  have  not.  They  teach, 
as  Menzies  says  of  those  verses  in  Mark,  'the  conditions  of  obtaining 
the  better  life  beyond.'  The  parallel  in  the  Talmud  (Tamid  32  a) 
seems  to  have  a  less  distinctly  eschatological  meaning.  How  early, 
we  would  like  to  know,  did  the  saying  of  Jesus  receive  a  purely 
spiritual  signification,  without  reference  to  anything  which  may 
happen  to  us  after  death  ? 

'  For  me  and  the  gospel.'  The  gospel  is  added,  says  Holtzmann, 
to  make  the  saying  applicable  even  after  Jesus's  death. 

W.  says  that  the  gospel  here  means  much  the  same  as  'me,' 
for  in  Mark  Jesus  is  not  the  proclaimer,  but  the  content  of  the 
gospel.  The  gospel  is  the  Christ  preached  by  the  apostles. 
The  version  in  Q  (Matt.  x.  39  and  Luke  xvii.  33)  seems  more 
original  relative  to  Mark  than  the  parallels  to  the  previous  verse. 
The  higher  simplicity  and  originality  of  Luke  xviL  33  is  strongly 
urged  by  Bousset  (Theologische  Rundschau,  1906,  p.  10).  The 
addition  'for  me  and  the  gospel'  is  wanting  in  Luke.  Matthew 
has  only  'for  me'  (as  also  in  xvi.  25  and  Luke  ix.  24).  The  whole 
question  of  the  use  of  to  evayyeXiov  is  interesting  and  compli- 
cated. In  spite  of  its  absence  in  Luke  (who  only  uses  the  verb 
evayyeXi^eadai),  in  spite  of  Matthew's  omission  of  the  noun  in 
Matt.  X.  39  and  his  substitution  in  other  places  of  to  evayyeKiov 
TovTo,  or  TO  evayyeXiov  t^s  fiaat\eLa<!,  W.  holds  nevertheless  that 
Mark  is  always  older  than  any  other  source  of  Matthew  and  Luke. 
What  Matthew  and  Luke  do  is  that  they  consciously  try  to  avoid 
or  modify  the  obviously  proleptic  usage  of  Mark.  But  they  only 
make  the  anachronism  greater.  For  Jesus  is  made  to  proclaim 
a  gospel  which  consists  in  this  that  he  is  the  actual,  present 
(gegenwdrtige)  Messiah,  and  that  he  brings  the  actual,  present 
{gegenwartiges)  kingdom  upon  earth  (see  Einleitung,  p.  1 1 1). 

36  repeats  the  same  idea  as  35.  The  immortal  life  is  worth 
more  than  the  whole  material  world.  The  grandest  life  on  earth 
is  purchased  dearly  if  it  be  at  the  cost  of  the  life  of  the  great 
world  to  come,  the  life  after  the  reappearance  of  Christ,  the  life  of 
the  New  Jerusalem  and  the  Messianic  age.  This,  I  taise  it,  is  the 
simple  meaning  of  this  verse.  'Le  vocabulaire,'  says  Loisy,  'est 
tout  paulinien :  I'id^e  du  "  monde "  est  a  pen  pres  ^trangfere  k 
I'enseignement  du  Christ  synoptique '  {E.  S.  11.  p.  23,  n.  2). 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  207 

37.  This  verse  is  an  echo  of  Psalm  xlix.  8,  and  hence  we  may 
account  for  the  word  '  give '  where  '  receive '  would  make  a  better 
sense.  For  the  meaning  is,  what  can  a  man  obtain  in  exchange 
for  giving  up  his  true,  eternal '  life '  f 

38.  W.  argues  that  though  38  belongs  to  the  same  school  of 
thought  as  35,  it  is  of  older  date.     For  the  demand  upon  disciple- 
ship  made  in  38  does  not  go  so  far  as  that  in  35.     It  is  less 
absolute.    Moreover,  the  Son  of  man  ia  38  is  a  dififerent  figure 
from  the  Son  of  man  in  31.     For  in  31  he  is  synonymous  with 
Jesus  as  about  to  suffer  and  die,  whereas  in  38  he  is  the  glorified 
figure  of  Daniel  and  of  Jewish  eschatology.     Nor  in  38  is  he  to 
be  entirely  identified  with  Jesus ;  he  was,  at  least  originally,  con- 
trasted with  him.     For  the  phrase:  'he  who  is  ashamed  of  me, 
of  him  the  Son  of  man  will  be  ashamed,'  sounds  oddly  if  '  I '  and 
'  Son  of  man '  (i.e.  Jesus  and  Son  of  man)  were  intended  by  the 
original  author  of  the  sentence  to  be  one  and  the  same  person. 
Hence  the  deduction  would  be  that  38  was  written  when  the 
identification  of  Jesus  with  the  Son  of  man  was  not  complete. 
35  and  31  would  represent  a  more  developed  Christology  than  38. 
The  transitional  phraseology  whereby  Jesus  is  partly  distinguished 
from,  and  yet  partly  identified  with,  the  Son  of  man  is  further,  as 
it  would  seem,  illustrated  by  the  strange  use  of  '  Father '  in  the 
phrase  'in  the  glory  of  his  Father.'     The  Son  of  man  is  here 
modelled  upon  the  Son  of  man  in  Daniel,  but  the  words  '  in  the 
glory  of  his  Father '  would  not  fit  that  figure.     On  the  other  hand, 
except  in  xiii.  32,  Jesus  never  (in  Mark)  calls  God  his  Father.    He 
never  uses  such  a  phrase  as  '  in  the  glory  of  my  Father.'     Once 
only  does  he  address  God   in  the  vocative  as  Father,  but  the 
meaning  there  is  the  same  as  in  the  Lord's  Prayer  {cp.  Luke  xi.  2, 
'  Father,'  not  '  Our  father ').     It  is,  however,  quite  possible  that 
38,  like  35,  is  based  upon  a  saying  which  was  recorded  in  Q  and 
is  preserved  in  Matt.  x.  32,  33.    Bousset  (loc.  cit.)  is  strongly  of 
this  opinion.     In  Mark  the  'Son  of  man'  has  been  substituted 
for  the  personal  pronoun  in  Matthew.     And  in  Mark,  Jesus,  the 
Son  of  man,  is  clearly  the  heaven-sent  judge,  whereas  in  Matthew 
he  only  gives  evidence  before  God,  who  is  Himself  the  Judge. 
Bousset  denies  that  in  Mark  viii.  38  the  Son  of  man  can  ever 
have  been  meant   to   be  distinguished   from   Jesus.     If  Jesus 
believed  that  he  was  the  Messiah,  as  even  W.  admits,  how  can 
there  have  been  room  in  his  mind  for  another  quasi-Messiah,  the 
Son  of  man  ? 

Loisy  takes  much  the  same  line.  In  the  older  passage. 
Matt.  X.  32,  33,  'Jesus  had  said  that  he  would  confess  before  God 
those  who  had  confessed  him  before  men  and  that  he  would  deny 


2o8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  r 

those  who  had  denied  him ;  now  (in  Mark)  he  threatens  those 
who  should  be  ashamed  of  him  and  his  words  "in  the  midst  of 
this  adulterous  and  sinful  generation,"  that  is  to  say  those  who, 
failing  to  understand  the  mystery  of  the  Passion,  should  regard 
the  death  of  Jesus  as  a  reproach,  and  should  thus  be  ashamed  of 
the  gospel  before  the  Jews.  The  spirit  and  even  the  language  of 
Paul  can  be  recognized  in  this  development  (cp.  Romans  L  16). 
The  antithesis  has  thus  lost  its  clearness,  for  if  it  is  plain  what 
denial  by  the  Christ  means,  it  is  less  easy  to  understand  in  what 
his  being  ashamed  will  consist.  Jesus  appears  as  judge  and  not 
as  witness ;  he  does  not  present  men  to  his  Father,  he  comes  in 
the  glory  of  the  Father  and  is  accompanied  by  the  angels.  This 
apocalyptic  mise-en-scene  is  also  in  accordance  with  the  taste  and 
ideas  of  Paul.  The  Christ-judge  has  no  more  witness  to  give; 
his  attitude  towards  those  who  have  yielded  to  the  scandal  of  the 
cross  will  be  that  of  a  divine  monarch,  offended  in  his  dignity' 
(E.  S.  II.  p.  25). 

The  angels  accompany  the  Son  of  man  (here  undoubtedly 
identified  with  the  Messiah)  when  be  comes  down  from  heaven  for 
the  Last  Judgment. 

ix.  I.  Some  hold  that  this  verse  is  an  addition  to  viii.  38. 
'  And  he  said '  marks  the  addendum.  It  is,  moreover,  argued  by 
W.  that  it  means  that  the  date  of  the  Judgment  is  postponed. 
For  viii.  38  declares  that  those  who  rejected,  or  were  afraid  to 
acknowledge,  Jesus  would  be  rejected  by  the  Son  of  man  at  the 
Judgment  Day.  It  is  implied  that  the  Judgment  will  take  place 
during  the  lifetime  of  all  those  who  have  rejected  him.  Here  (in 
ix.  i)  it  is  said  that  Jesus  will  not  come  as  soon  as  that ;  but  he 
will,  at  all  events,  come  before  all  his  disciples  have  passed  away. 
Thus  the  date  of  the  verse  must  be  a  time  when  most  of  Jesus's 
disciples  had  died,  but  when  the  hope  was  still  clung  to  that  the 
few  survivors  would  witness  the  long-expected  Parousia. 

On  the  other  hand  Loisy,  as  we  have  seen,  thinks  ix.  i  the 
true  sequel  of  viii.  30.  It  is  primitive  and  old,  though  probably  even 
this  '  old '  saying  we  have  not  in  its  first  and  most  authentic  form. 
Probably  the  assertion  had  a  more  absolute  character.  '  They 
who  are  here  will  not  die.'  But  many  apostles  were  already  dead 
when  the  text  received  its  present  form.  '  Coming  in  power '  may 
also  not  be  original ;  it  may  be  a  Pauline  expression  (Romans  i.  4). 
In  any  case  ix.  i  says  nothing  of  Jesus's  death  and  does  not  imply 
it.  It  is  at  least  doubtful,  says  M.  Loisy,  and  he  has  clearly' 
shown  which  way  his  own  convictions  tend,  whether  Jesus,  at  the 
time  of  the  confession  of  Peter,  had  conceived  his  death  as  the 
indispensable  condition  of  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom. 


VIII.  27-IX.  I]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  209 

But  whatever  the  date  when  38  and  ix.  i  were  written,  they 
do  not  in  one  important  respect  greatly  misrepresent  the  dominant 
thought  of  Jesus.  The  Kingdom  was  near — the  BLingdom  in  its 
true  eschatological  sense. 

'  The  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  in  power ' :  ev  Svvdfiei 
means  the  Kingdom  in  its  completed  development;  in  the  full 
realization  of  its  strength.  The  Kingdom  in  one  sense  has  already 
hegun ;  it  exists  potentially.  The  final  and  perfect  realization  will 
take  place  at  the  Parousia. 

Is  it  possible  that  the  historic  Jesus  did  of  a  truth  predict  his 
death  and  spiritual  resurrection,  but  that  he  did  not  predict  his 
return  or  manifestation  on  or  above  the  earth  as  the  holder  of  the 
Great  Assize  ?  That  he  predicted  his  dvaaraaii;  but  not  his 
irapova-ia  ?  Or  did  he  also  say  something  about  his  own  part  in 
the  general  resurrection  and  Judgment?  The  former  alternative 
seems  less  unlikely  than  the  latter. 

W.,  on  the  other  hand,  if  1  understand  him  aright,  holds  that 
the  historic  Jesus  predicted  neither  his  resurrection  nor  his  (second) 
advent  {•irapova-ia).  But  the  doctrine  of  his  resurrection  was 
believed  in  and  taught  before  that  of  his  (second)  advent  or 
coming  in  glory.  Hence  men  began  sooner  to  make  him  predict, 
and  to  say  that  he  predicted,  his  death  and  resurrection  than  his 
(second)  advent.  That  his  resurrection  and  ascension  betokened 
the  near  coming  of  the  Kingdom  was  believed  before  it  was 
believed  that  he  himself  would  come  again  upon  earth  to  in- 
augurate and  establish  the  Kingdom  and  to  act  as  judge  at  the 
Great  Assize.  The  '  Son  of  man '  in  Mark  xiii.  26  was  originally 
not  Jesus;  he  was  even  for  a  short  time  not  Jesus  when  this 
Jewish  apocalj'pse  was  taken  over  and  Christianised.  The 
differentiation  between  '  me '  (Jesus)  and  the  '  Son  of  man '  in 
viii.  38  points  to  a  time  when  the  Son  of  man  was  not  yet  identified 
with  Jesus.  Hence  it  is  to  be  explained  that  in  this  section 
of  Mark  (viii.  27-x.)  Jesus  only  predicts  his  death  and  resur- 
rection, and  not  his  Parousia.  '  Of  his  Parousia  he  only  speaks 
in  the  Christian  appendix  to  the  old  Jewish  apocalypse  in 
xiii.  and  enigmatically  in  xiv.  62.  But  it  by  no  means  follows 
from  this  reluctance  of  the  oldest  Gospel  to  allow  Jesus  to  predict 
his  Parousia  that  the  belief  in  it  was  not  already  firmly  planted  in 
the  Christian  community.  Only  from  this  belief  can  we  account 
for  the  inconsistency  that  Jesus  in  Mark  viii.  27  seq.,  though  he 
does  not  predict  his  Parousia,  yet  calls  himself  the  Son  of  man  in 
a  specifically  Christian  and  anti-Jewish  sense.' 

The  identification  of  Jesus  with  the  Son  of  man  arose,  W. 
thinks,  with  the  growth  of  the  belief  in  the  return  (the  Parousia). 
'Jesus,  it  was  held,  must  have  predicted  his  Parousia.     Never- 

M.  14 


210  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

theless,  a  scruple  was  felt  to  make  him  say  straight  out,  "  I  shall 
shortly  reappear  as  Messiah  in  power  and  glory."  So  that  at  first 
he  was  made  to  say :  "  The  Son  of  man  will  appear  in  the  clouds 
of  heaven."  He  could  say  that  without  definitely  meaning  himself. 
It  was  left  to  Christian  interpretation  to  understand  that  he  did 
mean  himself,  and  on  this  point  there  was  no  lengthy  hesitation. 
The  next  step  was  to  make  the  Son  of  man  the  subject  of  pre- 
dictions of  the  Passion  and  the  resurrection,  where  the  words 
could  obviously  be  only  a  synonym  of  Jesus.  And,  finally,  the 
phrase  became  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  a  mere  equivalent  for  the 
first  person  singular,  even  in  passages  unconnected  with  such 
predictions.  This  last  usage  we  find  in  Matthew  and  Luke  and 
John,  in  Mark  only  once.'  (Apparently  W.  refers  to  x.  45 ;  he 
does  not  count  ii.  10,  28.     See  the  notes  on  those  passages.) 

Looking  back  upon  the  words  of  the  famous  passage  beginning 
'  He  who  would  follow  me '  (verse  34),  one  sees  what  a  profound 
ethical  and  religious  influence  they  have  had  upon  the  world. 
Like  many  other  words  of  genius,  they  have  this  sovereign  quality, 
that  they  are  capable  of  wide  and  varied  application.  It  may  be 
true  that  their  original  meaning  is  strictly  eschatological.  One 
can  reduce  them  to  the  rather  bald  statement :  he  who  would 
enjoy  eternal  life  must  be  willing  to  abandon  this  earthly  life,  or 
even  to  suffer  martyrdom.  But  though  this  be  the  original 
meaning,  the  words  were  soon  more  liberally  and  variously  in- 
terpreted. 

First  of  all  comes  the  conception  of  '  following  Christ  * :  the 
conception  of  leading  a  life  of  hardship  and  poverty,  of  purity  and 
sacrifice,  for  his  sake,  for  the  sake  of  truth,  for  the  sake  of  man, 
for  the  sake  of  God.  Jesus  kindled  an  unceasing  personal  devotion 
for  himself;  but  he  also  has  represented  the  other  terms.  To 
follow  him  has  been  for  endless  noble  souls  to  labour  and  renounce 
for  the  sake  of  truth,  for  the  sake  of  man,  for  the  sake  of  God.  No 
one  can  fail  to  recognize  what  a  rich  addition  to  the  moral  and 
religious  store  of  the  world  this  following  of  Christ  has  been  and 
has  brought  about. 

Its  distinctive  and  moral  note  was  upon  the  active  and  positive 
side.  For  it  might  be  said  that  from  the  Maccabsean  age  (Psalm 
xliv.  22)  the  Jews  have  suffered  and  renounced  and  undergone 
martyrdom  and  persecution,  for  the  sake  of  truth  and  for  the  sake 
of  God.  And  this  is  quite  true.  But  the  Jewish  devotion  has 
been  rather  passive  than  active.  Sooner  than  give  up  or  abandon 
the  truth,  sooner  than  renounce  the  Law  and  the  Unity  of  God, 
they  would  suffer  or  die.  The  new  note  in  the  following  of  Christ 
is  its  activity.  The  best  disciples  have  wanted  not  merely  to 
endure,  but  to  battle  with  evil,  to  win  proselytes,  to  transform  the 


VIII.  27-IX.  i]      THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  211 

world,  to  redeem  the  fallen,  to  cure  the  sick,  in  the  name  and  for 
the  sake  of  Christ. 

Then  come  the  two  simple  Greek  words,  dirapyrjaaaOat  eavrov, 
*  let  him  deny  himself  Here  again  we  have  what  is  practically  a 
new  conception.  Self-denial  was  not  unknown  before  Christ ;  but 
the  clear  conception  of  it  and  the  ideal  which  it  suggests  were,  I 
think,  new,  and  they  in  their  turn  have  exercised  an  immense 
influence  upon  men's  thoughts,  aspirations,  and  actions.  More 
restricted,  but  not  less  intense,  has  been  the  efifect  of  the  next 
words :  '  let  him  take  up  his  cross.'  The  true  follower  of  the 
Master,  in  proportion  to  the  perfection  of  his  discipleship,  must 
endure  and  renounce,  suflFer  and  die. 

When  we  come  to  the  rest  of  the  passage,  beginning, '  For  who- 
soever would  save  his  life  shall  lose  it,'  some  shadows,  I  fancy,  mingle 
with  the  light.  So  far  as  the  passage  has  made  men  realize  that 
what  we  may  call  the  things  of  the  spirit — truth  and  righteous- 
ness— are  not  only  rather  better  than  the  things  of  sense,  but  on 
a  different  plane,  better  in  kind,  it  can  only  have  done  good.  Or, 
again,  so  far  as  it  has  made  men  realize  that  the  ultimate  right 
thing  for  each  one  of  ua  is  to  develop  his  own  best  self  to  the 
utmost,  that  in  the  long  run  the  cultivation  of  the  soul  is  the  final 
end  of  all  education  and  development,  it  has  lifted  men  above 
temptation  and  nerved  them  to  higher  things.  The  doctrine  it 
preaches  is  the  same  as  that  preached  by  Plato.  To  him  the  only 
thing  a  man  should  care  for  is  his  soul.  Her  he  must,  as  his  true 
life's  work,  seek  to  array  '  not  in  some  foreign  attire,  but  in  her 
own  proper  jewels,  temperance  and  justice  and  courage  and  nobility 
and  truth — in  these  adorned,  she  is  ready  to  go  on  her  journey  to 
the  world  below  when  her  hour  comes.'  It  is  quite  true  that 
on  the  hypothesis  of  a  future  life,  or  even  perhaps  without  it,  it 
cannot  profit  a  man  to  gain  the  world  and  lose  his  soul,  foregoing 
the  highest  of  which  he  is  capable. 

But  while  all  this  is  true,  it  may  be  questioned  whether  the 
passage  and  others  like  it  have  not  induced  the  false  individualism 
which  has  sometimes  marred  certain  phases  of  the  Christian  life — 
that  false  individualism  whereby  the  religious  life  has  sometimes 
been  set  in  antagonism  to  the  life  of  the  family  and  the  life  of  the 
State.  There  may  be  such  a  thing  as  a  selfish  or  even  morbid 
anxiety  about  the  saving  of  one's  soul,  leading  to  exaggerated 
asceticism,  hermit-like  withdrawal  fi:om  the  world,  or  neglect  of 
the  closest  duties  of  man.  Judaism  has  rightly,  I  think,  never 
sanctioned  or  admired  a  double  kind  of  religious  Ufe.  Its  ideal 
is  that  a  man  should  be  in  the  world,  though  not  of  the  world. 
To  neglect,  abandon,  or  disobey  your  parents  for  the  sake  of  the 
State  or  the  community  may  be,  under  certain  circumstances, 

14—2 


212  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [VIII.  27-IX.  i 

advisable  and  justifiable ;  to  do  so  for  the  sake  of  your  soul  is 
extremely  dubious.  Again,  the  saving  of  one's  soul  is  sometimes 
a  little  like  happiness ;  it  is  best  found  when  least  sought.  It  is 
not  always  the  safest,  surest,  and  healthiest  way  to  save  one's  soul 
to  think  too  much  about  it. 

But  these  reflections  do  not  detract  from  the  magnificence  of 
the  passage,  nor  do  they  tend  to  make  us  question  the  valuable 
religious  and  moral  effects  which  the  passage  has  produced  in  the 
history  of  the  world. 


CHAPTER  IX 

2-13.    The  Transfiguration 
{Gp.  Matt.  xvii.  1-13;  Luke  ix.  28-36) 

2  And  after  six  days  Jesus  took  with  him  Peter  and  James 
and  John,  and  led  them  up  on  to  an  high  mountain,  apart  by 

3  themselves.  And  he  was  transfigured  before  them,  and  his 
raiment  became  shining,  exceeding  white,  so  as  no  fuller  on  earth 

4  could   whiten   it.     And  there  appeared   unto  them  Elijah  with 

5  Moses :  and  they  talked  with  Jesus.  And  Peter  said  to  Jesus, 
'  Master,  it  is  good  for  us  to  be  here :  let  us  make  three  tents ; 

6  one  for  thee,  and  one  for  Moses,  and  one  for  Elijah.'     For  he 

7  knew  not  what  he  should  say ;  for  they  were  sore  afraid.  And  a 
cloud  arose  and  overshadowed  them  :  and  a  voice  came  out  of  the 
cloud,  saying,   'This   is   my  beloved   Son:    hearken   unto   him.' 

8  And  suddenly,  when  they  looked  round,  they  saw  no  one  any 
more,  except  Jesus  only  with  themselves. 

9  And  as  they  came  down  from  the  mountain,  he  commanded 
them  that  they  should  tell  no  man  what  they  had  seen,  till  the 
Son  of  man  had  risen  from  the  dead. 

ID        And  they  kept  the  command,  but  among  themselves  they 

11  disputed  what  'rising  from  the  dead'  might  mean.  And  they 
asked  him,  saying,  '  How  is  it,  then,  that  the  scribes  say  that 

12  Elijah  must  come  first  ? '  And  he  answered  and  told  them, 
'  Elijah  verily  cometh  first,  and  putteth  all  things  in  order ;  yet 
how  then  is  it  written  of  the  Son  of  man,  that  he  must  suffer 

13  much  and  be  despised?     But  I  say  unto  you  that  Elijah  hath 


IX.  2-13]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  213 

come  already,  and  they  have  done  unto  him  whatsoever  they 
wished,  as  it  is  written  of  him.' 

The  transfiguration  follows  dramatically  upon  the  previous 
scene.  The  Messiahship  is  divinely  confirmed.  Moreover,  the 
resurrection  also  is  implied  and  guaranteed.  Jesus  is  shown  as 
he  will  be  when  he  has  risen.  For  the  moment  his  material 
earthly  body  is  transfigured  into  what  it  will  be  after  the  resur- 
rection. How  old  is  the  tale  ?  And  whence  did  Mark  obtain  it  ? 
No  one  can  say  with  certainty.  B.  Weiss,  not  very  successfully,  as 
I  venture  to  think,  claims  it  for  Q  in  a  somewhat  shortened  form 
(see  Quellen,  B,  p.  65,  and  A,  pp.  184-187).  Loisy  ascribes  it,  like 
the  tales  of  the  baptism,  of  the  temptation,  and  of  the  miracle  of 
the  loaves,  to  an  'intermediate  redaction'  of  his  old,  narrative 
source  {E.  S.  i.  p.  115).  It  is  not  the  work  of  Mark  himself,  and 
its  original  purpose  was  not,  as  now  for  Mark,  to  emphasise  the 
Messiahship,  and  the  salvation  of  the  world  by  the  death  of  Jesus, 
but  to  counterbalance  the  scandal  of  his  death  by  the  anticipation 
of  the  glory,  and  to  picture  the  fulfilment  of  the  Law  and  the 
prophets  in  the  Christ  of  the  gospel '  {E.  8.  i.  p.  92). 

2.  Note  •  after  six  days.'  Why  this  singular  statement  ? 
Wellhausen's  explanation  is  given  below.  But  the  more  obvious 
explanation  is  that  the  story  is  based  upon  Exodus  xxiv.  12-18. 
It  is  '  after  six  days '  that  Moses  enters  into  the  midst  of  the  cloud. 
The  transfiguration  in  3  is  intended  to  outdo  the  shining  of  Moses 
in  Exodus  xxxiv.  29.  Where  was  the  mountain  ?  In  such  a  story 
as  this  we  need  not  ask.  It  is  the  same  mountain  as  in  Matthew 
xxviii.  16.  Note  that  Jesus  takes  with  him  Peter,  James  and 
John,  as  he  does  in  v.  37  (Jairus's  daughter)  and  in  xiv.  33 
(Gethsemane).  'Les  trois  r^cits,  dans  leur  forme  actuelle,  appartien- 
nent  h,  la  m^me  couche  de  redaction,  et  les  mSmes  preoccupations 
th^ologiques  et  apologdtiques,  le  m§me  art  symbolique  ont  dli 
avoir  part  k  leur  formation'  {E.  S.  11.  p.  31). 

3,  4.  Moses,  like  Elijah,  is  supposed  not  to  have  died  as  other 
men.  He  is  in  heaven,  not  in  Sheol.  There  is  an  old  apocalypse 
called  the  Assumption  of  Moses.  But  there  is  another  reason  for 
the  choice  of  these  two  men.  Their  joint  appearance  with  Jesus 
is  to  show  that  the  great  representatives  of  the  Law  and  of 
prophecy  recognize  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  and  do  him  homage. 

5-7.  The  unity  of  the  story  is  broken,  says  Loisy,  by  the 
'inept'  remark  of  Peter,  who  wanting  to  retain  Jesus  in  his  glory, 
would  unconsciously  desire  to  prevent  the  Messiah  from  redeeming 


214  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  2-13 

mankind  through  the  cross.    It  may,  therefore,  be  that  the  verses 
were  added  by  Mark. 

5.  '  Rabbi '  instead  of  the  usual  Greek  StSdaKoKe.     So  xL  21, 

Several  commentators  think  that  the  right  translation  is,  'It 
is  well  that  we  are  here '  (not  '  it  is  good  for  us  to  be  here,  it  is 
pleasant  here):  i.e.  it  is  fortunate  that  we  are  here,  for  we  can 
make  three  huts  for  you  and  Elijah  and  Moses. 

6.  Peter  and  his  colleagues  do  not  understand  that  Jesus 
must  die  in  order  that  the  prophecies  may  be  fulfilled.  He  wants 
to  see  the  Messiah  in  his  glory  all  at  once;  he  does  not  understand 
the  mystery  of  salvation  through  the  cross.  For  the  transfigura- 
tion is  clearly  connected  with  the  predictions  of  the  Passion ;  it 
justifies  and  explains  them. 

7.  The  cloud  is  the  supernatural  cloud  which  in  the  Penta- 
teuch conceals  and  reveals  the  presence  of  God.  For '  overshadowing 
them '  one  of  the  Syriac  translations  has  '  him '  (Jesus),  which  W. 
thinks  is  correct.  But  it  seems  an  unnecessary  change.  '  Them' 
means  Jesus,  Elijah,  and  Moses.  At  the  baptism  God  had  spoken 
only  to  Jesus  as  to  his  sonship;  now  the  disciples  are  also  informed. 
It  is  probable  that  '  Son '  here  goes  beyond  '  Messiah '  and  means 
more.  Both  baptism  and  transfiguration  may,  as  Loisy  thinks, 
represent  later  stages  of  Christological  development  than  the  con- 
fession of  Peter. 

8.  Moses  and  Elijah  vanish.  Before  the  new  authority,  the 
higher  revelation,  Law  and  prophecy  must  yield  and  give  place. 
The  glory  of  the  Christ  makes  the  glory  of  Moses  and  the  prophets 
disappear.  Compare  the  argument  in  2  Corinthians  iii.  (Pfleiderer, 
Urchristentum,  I.  p.  365). 

9-13  are  an  appendix  to  the  transfiguration  story.  The  last 
three  verses  are  very  hard. 

9.  In  accordance  with  the  general  theory  of  Mark,  the  full 
revelation  and  affirmation  of  the  Messiahship  are  only  to  be  made 
known  after  the  resurrection.  But  not  only  this.  For  why  may 
not  even  the  other  apostles  know  ?  says  the  relentless  Loisy.  To 
the  historian  it  is  as  clear  as  day :  before  the  death  of  Jesus  no 
one  had  ever  heard  of  the  transfiguration.  The  story  grew  up  out 
of  the  resurrection  story;  it  is  a  product  of  the  later  tradition  (£.  S. 
I.  p.  93,  II.  p.  40). 


IX.  2-13]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  215 

lO,  'They  kept  the  saying':  i.e.  either  they  observed  the 
command  that  they  were  not  to  talk  about  the  transfiguration, 
or  they  kept  hold  of  and  remembered  this  saying  about  his 
resurrection, 

'  Questioning  among  themselves ' :  i.e.  discussing  among  them- 
selves. A  Messiah  who  should  sufifer  and  die  and  rise  &om  the 
dead  was  an  enigma  to  them. 

11-13  do  not  seem  connected  with  lo.  Perhaps  Mark  put  the 
passage  here  because  he  somehow  connected  the  question  about 
Elijah  with  his  appearance  at  the  transfiguration,  but  originally 
I1-13  seem  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  that  story,  and  to  refer 
rather  to  ix.  i,  with  which  they  make  a  good  connection. 

irp&Tov.  Before  the  appearance  of  the  Messiah  in  glory  Elijah 
must  come.  Apparently  the  difficulty  which  the  disciples  imply  is 
this,  that  before  the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  Elijah,  according  to 
the  teaching  of  the  Scribes,  must  come  'and  restore  all  things': 
i.e.  put  things  to  rights.  To  this  Jesus  replies,  that  Elijah  was 
indeed  to  come  first  and  that  he  was  to  put  all  things  to  rights, 
but  he  asks  the  disciples  to  remember  the  other  prophecy  of  the 
suffering  Messiah.  The  final  explanation  is  given  in  verse  13. 
Elijah  had  already  come,  but  he  could  not  put  things  to  rights 
because  he  was  prevented  fi:om  doing  so.  And  this  very  prevention 
was  also  in  accordance  with  prophecy.  Thus  Elijah  has  appeared 
already,  though  he  was  not  able  to  do  what  was  expected  or  pre- 
dicted of  him  (Malachi  iv.  5,  6).  Nevertheless,  Jesus  asserts  that 
the  seeming  failure  of  Elijah  (==  John  the  Baptist)  was  also  pre- 
dicted in  the  Scripture.  By  this  he  apparently  means  that  the 
seeming  failure  of  Elijah  in  i  Kings  xix.  typifies  and  foretells  the 
seeming  failure  of  John  the  Baptist.  To  the  suffering  and  dying 
Messiah  there  corresponds  a  suffering  and  dying  precursor.  Jesus 
seems  to  accept  the  ordinary  interpretation  of  Malachi  iv.  5, 6,  but 
to  say  that  its  non-fulfilment  by  John  (who  was  Elijah)  was  due  to 
the  fault  of  the  unbelieving  Jews.  And  the  ultimate  reason  why 
John-Elijah  could  not  put  all  things  to  rights  was  because  to  have 
done  so  would  have  interfered  with  what  was  to  follow :  the  Passion 
and  death  of  the  Messiah. 

W.'s  explanation  is  a  little  different.  He  puts  a  note  of 
interrogation  at  iravra  in  12,  and  makes  Jesus  deny  that  putting 
all  things  to  rights  was  to  be  the  function  of  Elijah.  '  (Do  you 
say  that)  Elijah  must  first  come  and  restore  all  things  ?  But  in 
that  case  what  becomes  of  the  prophecy  that  the  Messiah  must 
suffer  and  die  ?  (i.e.  if  all  things  are  put  to  rights,  the  Messiah 
cannot  suffer).  Jesus  disposes  of  the  belief  of  the  Scribes  by 
appeals  to  prophecy.     But  in  13  he  says  that  Elijah  has  already 


216  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  2-13 

come  (i.e.  as  John),  and  he  has  suffered  in  accordance  with  pre- 
diction. 

But  neither  explanation  is  very  satisfactory.  It  is  hard  to 
think  that  the  passage  has  not  been  touched  up  and  confused. 
Several  scholars,  J.  Weiss,  for  example,  and  Volter,  and  Loisy,  have 
supposed  that  the  words, '  and  how  is  it  written  of  the  Son  of  man 
that  he  must  suffer  and  be  set  at  naught '  have  been  added.  They 
break  the  connection.  '  Ce  qui  s' oppose  k  la  venue  future  d'Elie 
n'est  pas  la  ndcessit^  de  la  passion,  mais  cette  venue  d6jk  acquise  k 
I'histoire.  L'annonce  de  la  passion  vient  en  surcharge  et  accuse  une 
retouche  dans  la  redaction  primitive'  (E.  8.  n.  p.  43).  Even  so  the 
argument  is  not  good,  for  Jesus  first  of  all  admits  the  opinion  of 
the  Scribes  that  it  was  foretold  of  Elijah  that,  on  his  reappearance 
he  was  to  put  all  things  to  rights,  but  he  then  goes  on  to  say  that 
his  being  prevented  from  doing  so  and  his  violent  death  were  also 
scripturally  foretold.  Without  the  interpolation  of  126,  Loisy 
thinks  that  the  passage  is  historical  There  is  nothing  said  of  the 
Messiah's  death  or  his  own.  John  has  come ;  prophecy  has  been 
fulfilled.  '  Rien,  par  consequent,  ne  s'opposait  k  I'av^nement  pro- 
chain  du  royaume.  Que  le  Messie  lui-m^me  diit  attendre  un  sort 
semblable  k  celui  d'Elie,  c'est-k-dire  de  Jean,  le  texte  ne  le  faisait 
pas  supposer.  La  mort  d'Elie  ne  rdpugnait  pas  au  programme 
apocalyptique  ;  elle  pouvait  meme  y  etre  comprise,  tandis  que  celle 
du  Messie  n'y  dtait  pas  pr^vue.  On  trouverait  done  un  sens 
complet  a  la  reponse  de  Jdsus,  sans  faire  intervenir  la  moindre 
allusion  k  sa  mort.  La  r^fdrence  aux  Ecritures  n'atteint  pas  les 
proph^ties  anciennes  qu'a  travers  la  tradition  apocalyptique  con- 
cernant  le  sort  d'Elie,  les  persecutions  subies  par  celui-ci  ne 
pouvant  figurer  qu'assez  imparfaitement  la  mort  du  Baptiste. 
J^sus  aurait  vu  I'accomplissement  des  proph^ties  dans  la  mort  de 
Jean,  et  n'aurait  pas  attendu  I'apparition  personnelle  du  prophfete 
avant  la  manifestation  du  royaume '  (E.  S.  II.  p.  44). 

In  verse  12  we  have  the  highly  important  statement  that  the 
sufferings  of  the  Son  of  man  (who  must  here  equal  the  Messiah) 
are  predicted  in  Scripture.  'This  is  the  only  passage  in  Mark  in 
which  such  a  prediction  is  alluded  to.  The  allusion  can  only  be 
to  Isaiah  liii.  It  was  only  gradually  that  this  chapter  assumed 
its  Christological  importance.  If  the  historic  Jesus  had  really 
thought  that  he  was  not  the  ordinary  Messiah,  but  the  servant  of 
Isaiah  xlii.  and  liii.,  should  we  not  have  had  more  allusions  to  and 
quotations  from  these  chapters  in  the  oldest  Gospel  ?  Would  not 
Jesus  himself  have  quoted  them,  and  would  not  his  citations  have 
been  remembered  and  chronicled  ? 

For  the  Rabbinical  view  and  tradition  about  Elijah,  see  Jewish 
Encyclopcedia, '  Elijah.' 


IX.  14-29]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  217 

W.,  and,  independently  of  him,  Dr  Kohler,  in  the  Jewish 
JSncyclopcedia  (article  'Jesus'),  have  suggested  that  the  trans- 
figuration was  originally  a  story  of  the  resurrection.  So  too 
Loisy.     W.'s  note  runs  as  follows: 

'It  was,  according  to  Romans  i.  4,  through  the  resurrection 
that  Jesus  was  proclaimed  the  Son  of  God.  He  appears  in  the 
company  of  Elijah  and  Moses  because  they  too  passed  straight 
from  earth  to  heaven,  and  are  not,  like  all  other  men,  in  Sheol. 
The  six  days  (in  ix.  2)  one  might  be  inclined  to  identify  with  the 
six  days  of  the  Passion.  It  would  not  be  inconsistent  with  the 
narrative  in  Mark  xvi.  if  Jesus  had  ascended  into  heaven  imme- 
diately after  death.  But  as  the  story  speaks,  not  of  the  act  of 
resurrection,  but  of  the  appearance  of  the  risen  one  to  the  three 
disciples,  one  can  interpret  the  six  days  as  the  interval  between 
the  death  of  Jesus  in  Jerusalem  and  his  appearance  in  Galilee. 
According  to  i  Cor.  xv.  5,  Jesus  first  appeared  to  Peter  alone. 
With  this  it  would  suit  that  Peter  (viii.  29)  first  recognizes  him  as 
the  Messiah.  The  transference  of  the  transfiguration  (i.e.  resur- 
rection) to  this  place  is  easily  intelligible  ;  it  is  in  keeping  with  the 
whole  section,  viii.  27-ix.  13.  For  throughout  viii.  27-ix.  13,  as 
in  the  transfiguration  story  itself,  Jesus  is  really  already  trans- 
figured, the  crucified  and  risen  one.' 

J.  Weiss  pleads  that  the  story  rests  upon  a  true  vision  of  Peter, 
which  was  enlarged  and  expanded  iuto  the  present  story.  It  is  a 
true  '  reminiscence.'  The  '  Petrine '  origin  of  the  stories  in  Mark 
has  to  lead  those  who  cling  to  it  to  very  dubious  lengths. 

Excellent  remarks  on  the  transfiguration  are  to  be  found  in 
Dr  Carpenter's  First  Three  Gospels,  pp.  143-151.  As  Moses  and 
Elijah  represent  the  Law  and  the  prophets,  so  does  the  transfigu- 
ration represent  pictorially  the  relation  of  Messiah  to  these  two 
great  powers  of  the  Jewish  Church,  and  their  supersession  by  the 
new  dispensation.  Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  the  transfiguration 
is  Pauline.  Peter  would  like  to  find  room  for  Moses  and  Elijah 
along  with  Christ.  But  this  is  not  the  view  of  Paul.  By  the 
death  and  resurrection  of  Jesus  the  need  of  Law  and  prophets  has 
disappeared.  Jesus  is,  and  should  be,  alone.  The  transfiguration 
shows  us  poetic  imagination  seeking  to  give  shape  to  the  thought 
of  Paul 

14-29.    The  Epilkptic  Child 
(Cp.  Matt.  xvii.  14-20;  Luke  ix.  37-43.  xvii.  S,  6) 

14       And  when   they   came  to  the   disciples,   they  saw  a  great 
crowd  around    them,   and    some   scribes   disputing   with   them. 


2l8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  14-29 

15  And  straightway  all   the  crowd,  when  they  beheld  him,  were 

16  greatly  amazed,   and  running  to  him,  welcomed  him.     And  he 

17  asked  them,  'What  are  ye  disputing  with  one  another?'  And 
one  of  the  crowd  answered  and  said, '  Master,  I  brought  unto  thee 

18  my  son,  who  is  possessed  by  a  dumb  spirit;  and  wherever  the 
spirit  seizes  him,  it  tears  him :  and  he  foams,  and  gnashes  his 
teeth,  and  wastes  away :  and  I  asked  thy  disciples  to  cast  it  out, 

19  but  they  could  not.'  Then  Jesus  answered  and  said  to  them, 
'  0  unbelieving  generation,  how  long  shall  I  be  with  you  ?   how 

20  long  shall  I  bear  with  you  ?  bring  him  unto  me.'  And  they 
brought  him  unto  him :  and  when  he  saw  Jesus,  straightway 
the  spirit  convulsed  him ;  and  he  fell  on  the  ground,  and  rolled 

21  about,  foaming.  And  Jesus  asked  his  father,  '  How  long  ago  is  it 
since  this  has  happened  to  him  ? '     And  he  said,  '  From  childhood, 

22  And  ofttimes  it  has  thrown  him  into  the  fire,  and  into  the 
water,  to   destroy  him:    but   if  thou   canst  do   anything,  have 

23  compassion  on  us,  and  help  us.'  Jesus  said  unto  him,  '  If  thou 
canst,  sayest  thou  ?  All  things  are  possible  to  him  that  believeth.* 

24  And  straightway  the  father  of  the  chUd  cried  out,  and  said,  'I 

25  believe;  help  thou  mine  unbeUef.'  When  Jesus  saw  that  more 
people  kept  running  up  to  him,  he  rebuked  the  unclean  spirit, 
saying  unto  it,  '  Thou  dumb  and  deaf  spirit,  I  command  thee, 

26  come  out  of  him,  and  enter  no  more  into  him.'  And  the  spirit 
shrieked,  and  rent  him  sore,  and  came  out  of  him :  and  he  was  as 

27  one  dead;  insomuch  that  many  said,  'He  is  dead.'  But  Jesus 
took  him  by  the  hand,  and  lifted  him  up ;   and  he  arose. 

28  And  when  Jesus  had  gone  into  the  house,  his  disciples  asked 

29  him  privately, '  Why  could  not  we  cast  it  out  ?'  And  he  said  unto 
them,  •  This  kind  goes  not  out  except  by  prayer  [and  fasting].' 

A  comparison  of  this  section  with  the  corresponding  sections  in 
Matthew  and  Luke  makes  it  probable  that  (i)  Mark  has  enlarged 
his  source  with  a  view  to  symbolism,  and  (2)  that  this  source 
(Q,  according  to  B.  Weiss,  Quellen,  A,  pp.  187-189,  B,  p.  66)  was 
also  known  to  Matthew  and  Luke. 

The  setting  of  the  miracle  seems  to  have  been  partly  influenced 
by  the  narrative  in  Exodus  xxxii.  1-6.  The  Israelites  wrangle 
with  Aaron  while  Moses  is  still  upon  Mount  Sinai.  If  they  behave 
ill  in  the  absence  of  Moses,  the  disciples  are  helpless  without  their 


IX.  14-29]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  219 

Master.  B.  Weiss  makes  a  good  point  by  showing  that  there  are 
traces  in  Matthew  and  Luke  that  in  the  source  the  child  was 
not  possessed  of  a  demon  at  all.  He  had  epilepsy,  and  of  this 
Jesus  healed  him.  Perhaps  Mark  added  on  the  demon  and  the 
possession  to  make  the  child  thus  represent  'humanity  delivered 
by  Jesus  of  its  spiritual  deafness  and  rendered  capable  of  praising 
the  God  whom  Jesus  has  revealed  to  it.'    So  Loisy  (^E.  S.  IL  p.  50). 

14.  The  Scribes  are  very  out  of  place.  They  are  not  mentioned 
again.  Nor  is  the  subject  of  dispute.  W.  would  like  to  omit  them, 
and  to  translate,  'he  saw  a  great  crowd  around  them,  and  that 
they  were  disputing  with  one  another.'  (So  in  16  he  translates 
reflexively,  '  What  are  ye  disputing  about  among  yourselves  ? ') 
The  dispute  is  as  to  why  the  disciples  are  unable  to  effect  the  cure. 
The  ordinary  view  is  that  those  whom  Jesus  questions  in  16  are 
the  crowd.  He  asks:  What  are  ye  disputing  about  with  them 
(the  disciples)? 

15.  '  They  marvelled.'  Why?  Some  commentators  say  because 
Jesus  arrived  so  suddenly  and  just  at  the  appropriate  moment. 
But  are  not  others  justified  in  thinking  that  the  wonder  is  rather 
due  to  visible  remnants  of  the  transfiguration  still  clinging  to  the 
face  and  form  of  Jesus  ?  Cp.  Exodus  xxxiv.  30.  Swete  objects  to 
this  view  because  ( i )  Mark  drops  no  hint  of  such  a  phenomenon, 
(2)  it  would  have  betrayed  what  Jesus  wants  to  keep  secret,  (3)  the 
result  is  just  the  opposite  of  what  happened  in  the  case  of  Moses. 
In  his  case  the  people  feared  to  come  nigh  :  in  the  case  of  Jesus 
they  ran  up  to  him.     But  this  '  contrast '  may  be  intentional. 

19.  To  whom  is  Jesus's  outburst  addressed  ?  Who  are  they 
who  have  awakened  his  anger  ?  It  is  not  easy  to  say.  The  request 
of  the  father  showed  no  incredulity :  on  the  contrary.  Does  he 
specially  address  the  disciples,  because  their  lack  of  faith  had  made 
them  fail  to  cure  the  child  ?  Would  Jesus  have  said  of  them 
before  the  crowd  that  he  longed  to  be  quit  of  them  ?  Or  did  he 
address  himself  to  the  crowd,  either  because  they  wanted  to  try 
the  powers  of  the  disciples  without  believing  in  them,  or  because 
they  were  always  anxious  for  a  miracle  ?  Both  the  last  explanations 
seem  very  strained  and  unlikely,  and  to  be  without  any  justifica- 
tion in  the  text.  On  the  whole,  the  lack  of  faith  in  the  disciples 
seems  the  best  explanation.  Jesus  generalizes,  and  includes  in 
their  want  of  faith  the  whole  generation  of  which  they  form  a  part. 
As  Loisy  says,  the  reproach  to  the  disciples  is  not  more  severe  than 
what  Jesus  had  already  said  to  Peter.  And  everybody  could  be 
associated  in  the  same  rebuke,  in  so  far  as  Judaism  and  the 
judaizing  apostles  were  concerned.    It  is  the  Paulinizing  Evangelist 


220  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  14-29 

who  speaks,  rather  than  the  historic  Jesus.  The  exclamation  of 
Jesus,  inexplicable  from  the  point  of  view  of  actual  history,  is 
justified  from  the  point  of  view  of  symbolism.  And  the  father  is 
included  in  the  rebuke,  so  far  as  he  represents  the  unbelieving 
crowd.  In  the  primitive  story  the  incapacity  of  the  disciples  was 
explained  by  the  especial  maliciousness  of  the  demon  or  the 
peculiar  difficulty  of  the  malady,  and  neither  father  nor  crowd  was 
blamed  (E.  S.  11.  p.  53). 

The  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  are  doubtless  meant,  as  J.  Weiss 
says,  to  indicate  that  Jesus  feels  sure  that  his  earthly  career  is 
soon  to  be  closed.  He  even  yearns  to  be  called  away  from  his 
fruitless  labours.  As  W.  quaintly  puts  it,  Jesus,  in  true  accordance 
with  the  conception  of  him  in  this  section,  has  one  foot  already  in 
the  other  world,  and  can  hardly  adapt  himself  to  the  earthly 
turmoil  to  which  he  has  returned. 

23.  Note  the  insistence  of  Jesus  upon  the  sovereign  power  of 
feith.  According  to  what  has  been  said  before  about  the  lack  of 
the  disciples'  faith  in  the  powers  of  healing  which  Jesus  had 
granted  to  them,  the  exclamation,  '  If  thou  canst !  sayest  thou ; 
all  is  possible  to  him  who  believes,'  should  refer  to  Jesus  himself. 
'  I,  at  all  events,  have  enough  faith ;  therefore  I  can  heal.'  But 
this  is  not  what  Jesus  means  here.  He  means :  '  If  you  (the 
father)  have  enough  faith,  then  I,  Jesus,  shall  be  able  to  heal  your 
son.' 

It  may  be  noted  here  that  the  noun  ttiVt*?  (faith)  occurs  some 
five  times  in  Mark,  the  verb  Trccrrevo)  some  ten  times,  while 
dirKj-TLa  occurs  once,  and  airia-ro';  twice.  The  faith  which  Jesus 
possesses  and  demands  is  trust  in  God  and  in  the  powers  which 
God  has  given.  Here,  for  instance,  the  father  has  to  have  faith 
that  God  has  really  granted  to  Jesus  the  power  to  heal  (or  to 
expel  demons).  Jesus  did  not  ask  for  faith  in  his  own  person  as 
such,  or  in  his  Messiahship.  It  was  Paul  who  first  made  this  faith 
— faith  in  Christ  as  redeemer — the  test  of  salvation.  He  changed, 
as  Professor  Wahrmund  rightly  says,  the  words  '  Follow  me '  mto 
'  Believe  in  me.'  And  thus  the  first  significant  step  was  taken  on 
that  road  which  led  from  inwardness  to  extemalism,  from  liberty 
to  servitude.  Jesus  sat  at  table  with  sinners  and  tax  collectors : 
in  the  circle  of  Pauline  Christianity,  the  question  is  already  raised : 
'  What  has  the  believer  to  do  with  the  unbeliever  ? '  (Religion  und 
Klerikalismics,  p.  14). 

24.  One  cannot  but  be  struck  with  the  nobility  of  the  outcry, 
'help  thou  my  unbelief:  i.e.  if  my  belief  is  still  not  adequate, 
help  me  to  increase  it.  The  beseeching  request  to  help  his  un- 
belief is  itself  a  confession  of  faith.     But  it  is  possible  that  the 


IX.  14-29]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  221 

words  should  be  taken  to  mean :  '  what  is  wanting  in  my  faith  do 
thou  helpingly  supply':  i.e.  though  I  do  not  believe  enough, 
nevertheless  help  me. 

25.  eiTi,<TvvTpe-)(ei.  Apparently  this  means  (not  that  Jesus 
had  taken  father  and  child  apart,  and  that  the  people  are  running 
up  to  them,  but)  that  the  crowd  keeps  becoming  greater.  To  put 
an  end  to  their  importunity,  Jesus  waits  no  longer,  but  proceeds 
to  work  the  miracle.  On  the  other  hypothesis,  Jesus  cures  the 
child  before  the  crowd,  eager  to  see  the  wonder,  has  arrived.  For 
27  seq.,  cp.  Chapter  v.  39-42,  The  one  passage  may  have  been 
imitated  from  the  other. 

28-29.  An  appendix  to  the  story.  When  Jesus  gives  private 
explanations,  we  know  that  the  Evangelist  himself  is  at  work.  We 
have  seen  how  difficult  it  is  to  account  for  Jesus's  rebuke  if  it  was 
addressed  to  or  included  the  disciples.  As  an  instance  of  '  reading 
into '  the  text,  I  may  quote  the  explanation  of  Swete.  '  The 
disciples  had  trusted  to  the  quasi-magical  power  with  which  they 
thought  themselves  invested  :  there  had  been  on  their  part  no 
preparation  of  heart  and  spirit.'  And  it  seems  strange  to-day  to 
read:  '  Spirits  of  such  malignity  were  quick  to  discern  the  lack  of 
moral  power  and  would  yield  to  no  other.' 

29.  The  power  requisite  for  such  healing  can  only  be  obtained 
by  earnest  and  assiduous  prayer.  Some  MSS.  add  also  kuI 
vtja-Teia,  'and  through  fasting'  (Matt.  xvii.  21).  Here  the 
position  taken  up  in  23  seems  changed.  It  is  not  faith  that 
works  the  miracle,  or  gives  the  power  to  work  it,  but  prayer. 
To  combine  the  two  views  one  would  have  to  say  that  the  prayer 
produces  the  faith.  But  the  natural  order  is  for  the  faith  to 
produce  the  prayer.  Hence,  perhaps,  W.  is  right  in  thinking  the 
verse  hardly  conceivable  as  a  saying  of  Jesus.  He  points  out  that 
Matthew  must  have  found  it  difficult,  for  he  seems  to  have  substi- 
tuted for  it  his  xvii.  20.  Undoubtedly  28  and  29  are  on  a  lower 
religious  plane  than  23.  '  The  immediate  feeling  of  certain  conquest 
and  ascendancy  peculiar  to  the  primitive  Christian  enthusiasm  is 
seen  in  the  process  of  disappearing ;  circumstantial  preparations 
and  ritual  acts  are  needed  in  order  to  become  master  of  the  evil 
spirits'  (J.  Weiss).  Klostermann  rightly  says  that  the  reply  of 
Jesus  (even  without  the  'fasting')  is  very  obscure.  'Does  he 
mean  to  reproach  the  disciples  with  having  omitted  to  pray,  and 
relied  instead  on  the  mere  magical  power  of  working  miracles  ? ' 

What  are  we  to  say  of  the  faith  preached  and  praised  in  this 
story  ? 


222  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  14-29 

It  seems  at  first  remote  from  us  because  it  is  so  connected 
with  the  miraculous.  We  certainly  do  not  believe  that  faith  can 
work  miracles  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word;  and  it  seems 
almost  impossible  to  believe  that,  through  the  faith  of  A,  B,  who 
is  unaware  of  that  faith,  can  be  healed.  We  do  not  clearly  see  why, 
if  Jesus  could  miraculously  cure  the  epileptic  boy,  so  that  he 
never  had  epilepsy  again,  and  fully  and  permanently  recovered  his 
speech,  he  could  not  have  done  so  whether  the  father  of  the  child 
believed  in  his  miraculous  powers  or  not.  It  may,  however,  be 
argued  that  the  faith  of  A,  who  is  intensely  interested  in  the  cure 
of  B,  may  help  C  to  perform  it. 

But  we  are  in  truth  attempting  the  impossible  in  such  inquiries. 
We  can  never  know  what  measure  of  historical  truth  underlies  the 
tale.  And  with  regard  to  Peter  and  Jesus  walking  on  the  sea,  we 
neither  believe  that  the  story  happened,  nor  that  such  a  thing 
could  happen.  No  amount  of  faith  that  he  would  be  able  to  walk 
on  the  sea  would  enable  a  man  to  do  it. 

But  because  we  cannot  use  the  sayings  of  Jesus  about  faith 
literally  in  the  form  in  which  we  have  them,  it  does  not  follow 
that  they  are  valueless  or  false.  The  power  of  faith  and  the  value 
of  trust  are  still  enoi-mous.  Jesus  as  the  prophet  of  faith  and  trust 
has  still  a  message  to  the  world. 


30-32.    Second  Prediction  of  Suffering,  Death 
AND  Resurrection 

{Gp.  Matt.  xvii.  22,  23 ;  Luke  ix.  43-45) 

30  And    they  departed    thence,   and    passed    through   Galilee; 

31  and  he  desired  that  none  should  know  it.  For  he  taught  his 
disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  The  Son  of  man  will  be  delivered 
into  the  hands  of  men,  and  they  will  kill  him ;  and  after  he  has 

32  been  killed,  he  will  rise  after  three  days.'  But  they  understood 
not  the  saying,  and  were  afraid  to  ask  him. 

The  journey  to  Jerusalem  now  begins.  Jesus  passes  through 
Galilee  incognito.  For  the  reason  see  the  note  on  vi.  30-33. 
What  he  told  the  disciples  in  31  is  made  the  reason  for  the 
secrecy  of  30,  but  it  does  not  properly  explain  it.  In  the  oldest 
form,  or  in  the  source,  of  Mark,  one  may  conjecture,  with  Loisy, 
that  ix.  I,  II,  12  a,  13,  30,  33  a  followed  hard  upon  each  other. 
The  French  scholar  is  in  full  agreement  here  with  W. :  '  S'il 
traversait  incognito  la  Galilt^e,  c'etait  pour  ne  pas  attirer  I'attention 


IX.  33-50]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  223 

d'H^rode ;  il  n'dtait  pas  autrement  preoccupd  de  sa  mort  prochaine 
ni  de  I'mstruction  des  disciples'  {E.  S.  u.  p.  61). 

The  predictions  of  his  death  are  repeated  several  times.  They 
are  inserted  without  any  close  connection  with  their  context,  nor 
do  they  refer  to  each  other.  The  predictions  can  only  in  the  most 
limited  sense  he  historical.  Pfleiderer  thinks  that  Jesus's  entry 
and  action  in  Jerusalem,  as  well  as  his  last  words  upon  the  cross, 
give  the  undoubted  impression  that  he  went  to  Jerusalem  not  to' 
die,  but  to  fight  and  to  conquer.  Defeat  and  death  may  have 
crossed  his  mind  as  a  possibility,  but  not  more  than  this,  just 
as  they  cross  the  mind  of  a  general  upon  the  eve  of  battle 
(JJrchrisftentum,  i.  p.  360). 

32.  The  disciples,  as  usual,  are  obtuse.  In  ix.  11  they  ask 
questions;  here  they  are  represented  as  afraid  to  do  so. 


33-50.    Who  is  the  Greatest  ? — Of  Stumbling-blocks 
AND  other  Matters 

{Gp.  Matt,  xviii  1-9;  Luke  ix.  46-50,  xvii.  i,  2) 

33  And  they  came  to  Capernaum :  and  when  he  was  in  the 
house,  he  asked  them,  '  What  did  ye  discuss  among  yourselves  on 

34  the  way  ? '     But  they  held  their  peace :  for  on  the  way  they  had 

35  argued  among  themselves  who  was  the  greatest.  And  he  sat 
down,  and  called  the  Twelve,  and  said  unto  them, '  If  any  man 

36  desire  to  be  first,  let  him  be  last  of  all,  and  servant  of  all.'  And 
he  took  a  child,  and  set  him  in  the  midst  of  them:  and  he  embraced 

37  him,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Whoever  shall  receive  one  of  these 
children  in  my  name,  receiveth  me :  and  whoever  receiveth  me, 
receiveth  not  me,  but  Him  that  sent  me.' 

38  And  John  said  to  him,  '  Master,  we  saw  one  casting  out 
demons  in  thy  name,  and  he  does  not  follow  us :  and  we  sought 

39  to  prevent  him,  because  he  did  not  follow  us.'  Bnt  Jesus  said, 
'  Prevent  him  not :  for  no  man  who  doeth  a  miracle  in  my  name, 

40  will  readily  speak  evil  of  me.     For  he  that  is  not  against  us  is 

41  for  us.  For  whoever  shall  give  you  a  cup  of  water  to  drink  in 
my  name,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ,  verily  I  say  unto  you,  he 

42  shall  not  lose  his  reward.  And  whoever  shall  cause  one  of  these 
little  ones  that  believe  to  stumble,  it  were  better  for  him  that  a 


224  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

millstone  were  hanged  about  his  neck,  and  he  were  cast  into  the 
43  sea.    And  if  thy  hand  cause  thee  to  stumble,  cut  it  oflF:   it  is 

better  for  thee  to  enter  into  Life  maimed,  than  having  two  hands 
4S  to  go  into  hell,  into  the  fire  that  shall  never  be  quenched.     And 

if  thy  foot  cause  thee  to  stumble,  cut  it  off:  it  is  better  for  thee 

to  enter  lame  into  Life,  than  having  two  feet  to  be  cast  into  hell. 

47  And  if  thine  eye  cause  thee  to  stumble,  pluck  it  out :  it  is  better 
for  thee  to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God  with  one  eye,  than 

48  having  two  eyes  to  be  cast  into  hell :  where  their  worm  dieth  not, 

49  and  the  fire  is  not  quenched.     For  every  one  shall  be  salted  with 

50  fire.  Salt  is  good :  but  if  the  salt  have  lost  its  saltness,  wherewith 
will  ye  season  it  ?  Have  salt  in  yourselves,  and  keep  peace  with 
one  another.' 

This  section  can  be  split  up  into  three  or  four  sub-divisions, 
but  these  are  not  clearly  marked.  We  may  mark  off  33-37,  38-41, 
42-48,  49-50.  There  is  a  certain  parallelism  between  33-37  on 
the  one  hand,  and  x.  35-45  and  x.  13-16  on  the  other.  The  lesson 
given  in  ix.  35  is  almost  verbally  the  same  as  that  given  in  x.  43, 44, 
and  it  has  therefore  been  inferred,  with  much  probability,  that 
different  settings  have  been  given  by  Mark  to  one  and  the  same 
saying  which  he  has  taken  from  his  source  (i.e.  Q,  according  to 
B.  Weiss,  Loisy  and  other  scholars).  Again  the  incident  with  the 
children  is  twice  repeated.  It  occurs  in  ix.  36  and  x.  16.  Doubt- 
less it  is  one  and  the  same  incident  which  has  suggested  both 
forms  of  the  story.  It  is  even  held  that  the  occasion  and  setting 
of  the  lesson  given  in  ix.  35  and  x.  42  was  a  single  incident  which 
only  the  Evangelist  has  doubled. 

34.  '  Who  was  the  greatest  ? '  But  the  words  may  mean  not 
greatest  now,  but  who  will  be  greatest  in  the  Kingdom.  So 
Matthew  (xviii.  i),  and,  what  is  very  important,  so  the  S.S. 
Cp.  also,  for  the  wording,  Luke  xxii.  14,  which  may  be  the 
original  form  of  the  opening  of  the  story. 

35.  'He  called  the  Twelve.'  This  is  odd,  for  in  33  Jesus  is 
indoors  with  his  disciples.  Why  need  he  'call  the  Twelve'  ?  Yet 
there  seems  no  distinction  to  be  made  between  the  Twelve  and 
those  disciples  who  have  been  mentioned  in  33. 

Jesus  is  here  supposed  to  read  the  hearts  of  the  disciples.  He 
knows  about  what  they  have  been  talking.  In  Matthew  the 
disciples  openly  ask  him  the  question,  which  is  more  natural. 

The  saying  in  35  means:  The  only  test  of  superiority  in  my 


IX.  33-5°]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  225 

Kingdom  ia  service.     He  who  serves  best  shall  be  regarded  as 
the  greatest.     It  is  these  simple  and  profound  sayings  which  seem 
best  to  reflect  the  historical  Jesus.     How  can  anyone  fairly  and 
honestly  argue  that  such  a  sublime  saying  is  not  an  ethical  and 
rehgious  gain  over  and  above  the  great  ethical  and  religious  stores 
in  the  Old  Testament  ?    And  if  it  could  be  shown  that  all  the 
great  sayings  of  Jesus  were  verbally  and  textually  contained  in  the 
Talmud,  it  might  still  be  justly  argued  that  the  lack  of  familiarity 
with  the  New  Testament  is  a  great  loss  to  the  Jews.     For  most 
Jews  do  not  know  the  Talmud.     Their  religious  literature  is  con- 
fined to  the  Old  Testament  and  the  Prayer-book.    And  in  the 
huge  bulk  of  the  Talmud  the  great  passages  are  overwhelmed 
and  lost  to  view  by  the  mass  of  trivial,  worthless  or  second-class 
matter.     Moreover,  no  collection  of  Rabbinical  sayings  that  I  am 
acquainted  with  can  rival  the  sayings  of  Jesus  in  impressiveness, 
profundity,  and  power.     To  have  been  familiar  with  them  from 
childhood  must  surely  be  an  important  ethical  and  religious  asset 
in  people's  lives.     And  once  again  we  mark  in  this  verse  the  note 
of  active  devotion  and  personal  service.     Kindness  and  charity 
{gemiluth,  chesadim)  are  familiar  enough  in  the  Rabbinical  litera- 
ture.  But  I  do  not  think  I  am  wrong  in  supposing  that  this  touch 
of  eager  personal  service,  especially  towards  the  sinner  and  the 
outcast,  was  a  special  characteristic  of  the  religion  of  Jesus,  and  a 
new  thing  when  he  preached  it. 

J.  Weiss,  while  holding  that  the  original  meaning  of  Jesus's 
saying  was  that  true  greatness  consists  in  service  {cp.  Mark  x.  43), 
thinks  that  the  saying  has  here  received  another  stamp.  It  is  a 
judgment  sentence.  He  who  seeks  to  be  first  in  the  Kingdom 
shall  be  degraded.  He  shall  be  the  last,  the  servant  of  all.  Not 
the  apostles,  but  the  child  is  the  true  representative  of  Jesus. 

The  saying  of  35  reappears  many  times  in  the  Synoptics.  Gp. 
Mark  x.  43,  44 ;  Matt.  x.  26,  27,  xxiii.  1 1  ;  Luke  ix.  48  b,  xxii.  26. 
The  simplest  (perhaps  most  original)  form  is  Matt,  xxiii.  1 1. 

36.  W.  argues  that  36,  37  is  '  a  separate  whole,'  and  that  it  is 
not  closely  connected  with  33  and  34.  [35  6  is  wanting  in  the  MS. 
D,  and  W.  suggests  that  it  may  have  been  added  here  to  make  a 
better  connection  between  33,  34  and  36,  37.]  For  what  36  and 
37  say  is  how  others  are  to  be  treated  by  the  disciples,  not  how 
they  are  themselves  to  behave.  The  child  is  not  here  a  type  of 
humility  and  '  Anspruchslosigkeit '  (as  in  x.  15),  but  the  type 
of  the  poor  and  the  simple  who  are  to  be  welcomed  and  served 
in  the  name  of  Christ.  37  can  be  connected  with  35,  inasmuch 
as  the  servant  of  all,  who  is  the  greatest  of  all,  is  also  be  who 
receives  the  smallest  and  humblest  for  the  sake  of  Christ. 

M.  IS 


226  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

How,  says  Loisy,  could  a  real  child  so  represent  Jesus  that  in 
■receiving'  it  one  receives  him  ?  Matt.  x.  40  suggests,  Loisy  thinks, 
the  real  meaning.  The  child  is  an  apostle.  '  Ce  n'est  pas  le 
premier  enfant  venu  que  peut  se  pr6valoir  du  nom  du  Christ :  car, 
pour  Stre  re^u  "  au  nom  "  du  Christ,  il  faut  porter  ce  nom  avec 
soi.  L'enfant  k  recevoir  est  done  envoyd  de  J6sus,  comme  J^sus  est 
envoy^  de  Dieu.  C'est  rap6tre,  comme  on  le  voit  en  Matthieu, 
oil  cette  sentence  a  place  dans  le  discours  de  mission.  Marc  fait 
recommander  aux  Douze  d'avoir  ^gard  aux  "petits"  apotres;  on 
peut  croire  qu'il  a  surtout  en  vue  le  "  petit "  Paul,  le  "  moindre  des 
apotres,"  qui  n'^tait  "  pas  digne  d'etre  appeM  apotre,"  mais  qui 
croyait  avoir  autant  fait  que  "  les  grands  ap6tres  "  et  ne  leur  ^tre 
inflrieur  en  rien '  (E.  S.  II.  p.  69).  If  this  hidden  meaning  is 
the  true  one,  which  seems  to  me  somewhat  doubtful,  the  con- 
nection between  33-35  and  36-37  would  be  found.  Both  teach 
the  same  lesson  to  the  same  people. 

37.  Gp.  Matt.  X.  40 ;  from  Q.  Did  Mark  also  take  his  verse 
from  that  source  ?  He  adds  '  in  my  name.'  Is  this  a  translation 
of  the  Hebrew  idiom,  meaning  '  for  my  sake  '  ?  Or  does  it  mean : 
'because  I  desire  it,'  'as  a  part  of  Christian  duty'?  In  Mark 
the  phrase  is  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  ix.  37  and  39, 
(perhaps  also  in  ix.  41),  and  in  xiii.  6  (cp.  xiii.  13,  xvL  17).  The 
'  name,'  W.  asserts,  is  not  Jesus,  but  Christ ;  but  if  the  phrase  is 
a  mere  translation  of  the  Hebrew  idiom,  it  is  neither  the  one 
nor  the  other.  For  then  it  merely  means  '  for  my  sake.'  Merx 
holds  that  the  meaning  is :  '  for  the  reason,  or  on  the  ground,  that 
he  belongs  to  me.'  The  phrase  is  correctly  interpreted  in  41, 
'because  ye  belong  to  Christ.'  Heitmiiller,  who  in  his  excellent 
book  Im  Namen  Jesu  has  given  all  these  '  name '  passages  the 
most  thorough  investigation,  holds  that  even  here  the  usual 
meaning,  i.e.  the  invocation  of,  the  absolute  calling  upon,  the  name 
of  Jesus  can  still  be  maintained.  '  He  who,  invoking  my  name, 
receives  one  of  these  children.'  But  he  thinks  that  perhaps  in 
this  particular  passage  '  for  my  sake '  may  be  the  right  rendering. 

'  Receiveth  me.'  If  the  service  is  done  for  the  sake  of  the 
Master,  and  because  he  desired  it,  it  is  reckoned  as  if  it  had  been 
done  to  the  Master  himself.  The  dynamic  effect  of  this  saying 
has  been  enormous.  All  social  service  wrought  in  Christ's  name 
and  spirit  is  wrought  to  him.  Who  can  measure  or  count  the 
deeds  of  sacrifice  and  love  to  which  this  saying  has  prompted  ? 

'Him  that  sent  me.'  What  are  we  to  make  of  this?  Is  it 
part  of  a  unique  self-assurance  in  Jesus,  part  of  his  consciousness 
that  he  was  a  superior  being,  the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  God, 
perhaps  himself  divine  ?     There  seems  no  absolute  necessity  for 


IX.  33-50]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  227 

this.  Isaiah,  no  less  than  Jesus,  believed  that  God  had  'sent' 
him.  Doubtless  Jesus  believed  that  he  was  sent  by  God,  and  he 
probably  held  that  he  was  the  Messiah.  Yet  the  saying,  which 
Mark  records,  'Why  callest  thou  me  good?  Only  God  is  good,' 
shows  that  he  did  not  ascribe  to  himself  a  sinless  pre-eminence  of 
perfection.  Social  service  is  the  right  service  of  the  Messiah,  and  it 
is  also  the  right  service  of  God.  If  Jesus  said  this  verse,  I  would 
venture  to  think  that  he  did  not  mean  that  any  service  rendered 
to  himself  was  a  service  rendered  to  God,  but  rather  that  the 
service  of  the  poor  was  the  service  both  of  himself  and  of  God. 

'  Receive.'     In  what  sense  is  the  word  used  ? 

The  literal  meaning  need  not  be  pressed.  To  receive  the  child 
may  mean  to  serve  it,  to  show  it  kindness.  But  possibly,  if  the 
child  is  a  type  of  a  lowly  and  despised  man,  then  to  'receive' 
the  child  means  to  accept  and  receive  such  a  man  into  the  Christian 
brotherhood. 

But  in  what  sense  can  Jesus  himself  be  '  received '  ?  In  what 
sense  can  God  be  '  received '  ? 

Do  the  words  mean  more  than  that  a  good  deed  done  for  the 
sake  of  Jesus  is  like  a  good  deed  done  to  him,  a  good  deed  done 
for  him  is  like  a  good  deed  done  to  God  ? 

But  the  use  of  the  word  '  receive  '  suggests  mystical  meanings. 
The  indwelling  spirit  of  Christ  or  of  God  may  be  said  to  be  're- 
ceived '  through  goodness,  self-sacrifice,  and  love.  God  and  Christ 
may  both  be  said  to  '  dwell '  in  man  or  be  united  with  man.  If 
the  verse  occurred  in  the  fourth  Gospel,  that  would  be  its  meaning, 
but  it  is  scarcely  likely  that  this  mystical  meaning  is  the  correct 
interpretation  of  a  passage  in  Mark.  There  is  no  doubt  that  in 
the  precisely  identical  parallel  passage  of  Matthew,  the  word 
'receive'  has  a  far  simpler  sense  (x.  40).  For  there  the  saying 
occurs  as  part  of  the  discourse  to  the  apostles  when  Jesus 
despatched  them  upon  their  missionary  journey  (cp.  Luke  x.  16). 
If,  as  Loisy  thinks,  Mark  has  taken  it  from  the  common  source, 
i.e.  Q,  which  may  have  contained  Matt.  ix.  37,  38,  x.  5  b-8  a,  9-16, 
23-25,  40,  then  the  meaning  of  the  word  'receive '  is  quite  simple 
and  natural.  It  includes  the  giving  of  hospitality,  the  acceptance 
of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  through  the  mouths,  and  in  the  persons, 
of  his  emissaries.  It  must  be  admitted  that  the  simpler  sense 
of  '  receive '  would  seem  to  make  Matt.  x.  40  (Q)  more  primitive 
than  Mark  ix.  37  (Loisy,  E.  S.  i.  pp.  896,  897).  Loisy  indeed  holds 
that  the  whole  section,  Mark  ix.  33-50,  presents  the  character  of 
an  '  artificial  and  awkward  compilation.'  This  theory  is  the  very 
antithesis  of  W.'s  as  quoted  at  the  end  of  this  chapter. 

Even  if,  in  this  passage,  we  are  to  consider  the  child  as  the 
type  for  the  lowliest  and  most  despised  person  who  would  belong 

15—2 


228  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

to  Christ,  the  incident  to  which  our  passage  goes  back,  and  which 
recurs  in  Mark  x.  1 3,  may  be  regarded  as  historical.  The  affection 
which  Jesus  shows  towards  children  is  probably  a  historic  and 
characteristic  trait.  It,  too,  has  had  its  good  effect  in  the  history 
of  the  world.  Only  Mark  mentions  that  Jesus  took  the  child  in 
his  arms.  Gp.  x.  16,  where  only  Mark  records  that  Jesus  embraces 
and  blesses  the  children. 

38-40.  The  section  38-40,  or  rather  38-41,  presents  some 
diflScult  problems,  and  has  been  very  variously  interpreted.  One 
has  to  start  from  41.  This  verse  is  clearly  parallel  with  Matt. 
X.  42.  Now  we  have  seen  reason  to  believe  that  Mark  ix.  37  is 
based  upon  the  source  of  Matt.  x.  40  and  that  Matt.  x.  40 
represents  the  original,  and  not  Mark  ix.  37.  How  about  ix.  41  ? 
Is  that  verse  the  original  for  Matt.  x.  42,  or  does  Matt.  x.  42,  like 
X.  40,  also  come  from  Q,  and  is  it  more  original  in  form  than 
Mark  ix.  37  ?  If  Matt.  x.  42,  like  x.  40,  is  drawn  from  Q,  why 
does  the  change  of  '  you '  into  '  little  ones,'  which  Mark  made,  for 
his  own  purposes,  in  ix.  37,  appear  now  in  Matthew  ?  And  on  the 
other  hand,  why  does  Mark  have  'you  'in  ix.  41  instead  of  'little 
ones '  ?  If,  on  the  other  hand,  Mark  ix.  41  is  the  original  of 
Matt.  X.  42,  the  change  of  Mark's  '  you '  into  '  little  ones '  is  also 
rather  curious. 

Though  Mark  ix.  37  has  'little  ones'  (literally  'one  of 
these  little  children'),  and  ix.  41  has  'you,'  there  seems  to  be 
some  connection  between  the  two  verses:  both  speak  of  doing 
good,  or  being  kind  to  others  '  in  the  name  of  Christ,'  or  because 
the  recipients  are  Christians.  And  if  41  no  less  than  37  is  based 
upon  Q,  then  the  link  between  them  becomes  greater.  What 
then  about  38-40?    Why  are  these  vei-ses  intercalated? 

Some  hold  that  there  is  a  mere  verbal  connection.  38  has 
been  hung  on  to  37  on  account  of  the  words  '  in  my  name.'  This 
is  rather  unsatisfactory  on  account  of  41  which  one  would  like  to 
put  nearer  to  37.  Dr  Carpenter  {First  Three  Gospels,  p.  228) 
says  that  '  the  incident  described  in  Mark  ix.  38-40  so  obviously 
shatters  the  sequence  of  33-37,  and  41-47  that  it  has  been  widely 
regarded  as  a  late  insertion  founded  on  Luke  ix.  49,  50.'  But  on 
p.  210,  n.  I  he  states  that  Mark  ix.  38-41  (and  not  40),  breaking 
the  connection  of  37  with  42,  seems  to  have  been  added  from 
some  other  source  (cp.  Luke  ix.  49,  50). 

Very  ingenious  is  the  theory  of  Loisy.  He  holds  that  Mark 
ix.  41  is  the  original  of  Matt.  x.  42.  B.  Weiss,  of  course,  thinks 
the  contrary,  and  I  am  inclined  to  agree  with  him.  Moreover 
Loisy 's  own  theory  seems  strengthened  upon  this  hypothesis.  He 
points  out  that  though  41  is  connected  with  37,  and  though  these 


IX.  33-5°]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  229 

'id6es  connexes  ne  devraient  former  qu'une  seule  sentence,'  yet 
that  the  'you'  of  41  is  linked  to  the  sentence  'he  who  is  not 
against  us  is  with  us.'  [Still  more  would  it  be  so  linked  if  with 
the  MS.  D  we  read  '  you '  for  '  us '  in  both  parts  of  the  saying. 
And  if  41  is  based  upon  Q,  and  if  Q's  wording  is  kept  in  Matt. 

X.  42,  then  40,  especially  in  D's  form  of  it,  would  explain  the 
change  from  'little  ones'  to  'you'  in  41.] 

Why  then  did  the  Evangelist  put  38-40  between  37  and  41  ? 
Once  more  Loisy  brings  in  Paul  to  provide  the  explanation. 
The  Evangelist  could  not  express  his  meaning  openly,  but  he 
thought  his  readers  would  perceive  it.  The  story  is  very  unlikely 
as  history,  and  the  saying, '  He  that  is  not  against  us  is  for  us '  is 
modelled  upon  the  authentic,  'He  that  is  not  for  me  is  against 
me,'  which  Mark  has  omitted  (Matt.  xii.  30). 

'  If  the  little  one  who  must  be  received  as  if  he  were  Jesus 
himself  is  in  some  way  the  apostle  Paul,  it  is  easy  to  imagine 
that  John  the  son  of  Zebedee  here  represents  the  Judaizers  who 
opposed  him. ...But  the  Saviour  condemns  the  attitude  of  John; 
it  is  not  possible  that  a  man  who  does  miracles  in  his  name 
should  speak  ill  of  him,  or  should  not  be  in  the  true  faith  of 
Christ,  since  he  has  the  Spirit  of  God  which  works  in  Christ. 
The  reasoning  is  Pauline  in  substance  and  even  in  form  (cp. 
I  Cor.  xii.  3).  The  words  "  He  who  is  not  against  us  is  for  us  " 
would  be  open  to  suspicion  if  taken  in  a  general  sense ;  they  are 
the  sentence,  "  He  who  is  not  for  me  is  against  me  "  turned  round 
into  a  defence  of  the  apostle.  And  the  conjunction,  artificial  as 
it  is,  of  this  reflection  with  the  words  concerning  the  cup  of  cold 
water,  becomes  quite  natural,  if  it  is  Paul  who  is  not  against  the 
gospel  but  for  it,  and  Paul  again  who,  bringing  to  the  saints  of 
Jerusalem  the  alms  of  the  Gentiles,  has  a  right  to  his  reward 
before  God'  (H.  8.  11.  p.  74;  cp.  i.  p.  95). 

Note  that  'in  my  name'  means  in  38  and  39  something  very 
different  from  what  it  meant  in  37,  if  in  37  it  meant  'for  my 
sake.'  In  38  and  39  it  means  merely  the  utterance  of  the  actual 
name,  as  part  of  an  exorcist's  formula.  It  has  here  its  old  and 
regular  meaning  of  '  invoking  the  name  by  saying  it  aloud.'  The 
'name'  of  Jesus  was  believed  to  possess  as  strong  a  power  in 
protection  or  exorcism  as  the  name  of  God.  There  is  no  difiference 
in  meaning  between  the  two  different  Greek  prepositions  in  38 
and  39. 

The  situation  suggested  by  38  could  hardly  have  happened  in 
Jesus's  lifetime.  It  reflects  a  later  age,  when  the  reputation  of 
the  Christian  community  was  great  enough  to  tempt  outsiders  to 
try  their  fortune  as  exorcists  by  using  the  name  of  Christ.  Such 
people  are  not  to  be  checked;  perhaps  one  thing  may  lead  to 


230  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

another,  and  they  may  become  full  members  of  the  new  brother- 
hood. The  statement  that  a  man,  who  is  no  disciple  of  Jesus, 
nevertheless  exorcises  demons  by  the  name  of  Jesus,  is  extremely 
peculiar  and  interesting.  We  are  intended  to  suppose  that  the 
exorcisms  were  successful.  The  'name'  is  enough.  It  has  a 
magical  force,  and  compels  the  demons  to  yield  to  its  power. 
Radical  criticism  has  made  great  use  of  this  passage,  as  proving 
that  Jesus  the  Saviour  was  a  known  god  or  demi-god  before  Jesus 
of  Nazareth  was  born.  But  of  this  there  is  no  room  to  speak 
here. 

J.  Weiss  thinks  that  Jesus's  reply  in  40  is  half  ironic.  '  Let 
him  be ;  the  man  will  not  readily  revile  the  name  from  which  he 
earns  his  bread.  We  have,  at  all  events,  one  friend  in  the  hostile 
populace.'  [But  was  the  populace  yet  so  hostile  ?]  '  It  is  some- 
thing, or  even  much,  that  he  does  not  oppose  us  and  hinder  our 
work.'  The  saying,  Weiss  holds,  has  a  pessimistic  tenor.  Things 
are  so  bad  that  it  is  something  even  to  have  this  negative  sort  of 
friend. 

Finally,  W.  thinks  that  though  38  makes  as  it  were  a  fresh 
beginning,  it  yet  continues  the  thread  of  the  preceding  verses. 
For  it  also  teaches  humility  to  the  Twelve.  He  who  exorcises 
demons  in  the  name  of  Christ,  and  thus  acknowledges  him,  is  not 
to  be  repudiated,  even  though  he  does  not  join  himself  to  the 
Twelve.  [It  is,  however,  doubtful  whether  the  man's  employment 
of  the  name  as  an  exorcising  formula  is  meant  to  imply  any  real 
acknowledgment.  And  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  use  of  such 
a  formula,  during  Jesus's  lifetime,  is  extremely  unlikely.] 

Whatever  the  first  meaning  and  origin  of  the  saying,  'He 
who  is  not  against  us  is  for  us,'  it  was  soon  capable  of  extended 
applications.  It  can  indeed  be  used  for  most  broad  and  liberal 
interpretations.  Swete  says:  'The  man  who  is  not  a  declared 
enemy  of  the  Christian  brotherhood  may  be  provisionally  regarded 
as  a  friend.'  And  one  can  go  further  stilL  The  man  who  is  in 
sympathy  with  the  fundamental  teaching  of  Jesus  is  his  true 
follower,  whether  he  acknowledges  him  or  no.  Or  again:  all 
men  who  love  goodness  and  God  belong  to  the  same  religion  and 
are  allies  in  the  same  cause. 

41.  If  Loisy's  hypothesis  be  rejected,  and  Dr  Carpenter's 
also,  one  can  connect  41  with  40  by  saying  that  the  smallest 
service  rendered  to  the  disciples,  just  because  they  are  disciples, 
will  be  recognized  and  rewarded.  At  least  it  indicates  an  inclina- 
tion to  and  friendliness  towards  Christ,  even  if  the  doer  of  the 
service  does  not  yet  bear  his  name. 

'  In  my  name,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ.'     Another  readings 


IX.  33-5°]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  23 1 

is  'in  the  name,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ.'  Heitmtiller  thinks 
that  this  other  reading  (without  'my')  is  right,  and  that  the 
meaning  is  'on  the  ground  that  ye  are  Christians.'  But  if 
'my'  is  read,  then  he  holds  that  one  must  render:  'for  my 
sake,  because  ye  belong  to  Christ.'  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the 
formula,  'because  ye  belong  to  Christ'  is  Pauline  (cp.  i  Cor. 
iiL  23).  The  wording  of  Matt,  x,  40  '  in  the  name  of  a  disciple ' 
may  be  nearer  to  the  original.  Swete  makes  the  remark  that 
Christ  without  the  article  is  never  elsewhere  used  by  Jesus  in  the 
Synoptics. 

42-48.  This  section  deals  with  stumbling-blocks,  but  42  treats 
of  the  moral  seduction  of  others,  while  43-48  treats  of  the  moral 
seduction  of  oneself.  It  appears  to  be  based  upon  material  which 
is  also  found  in  Q ;  it  may  be  directly  taken  from  Q. 

42.  This  verse  makes  a  link  between  the  preceding  section 
and  43-48.  But  it  connects  best  with  37  (cp.  Dr  Carpenter's 
second  hypothesis  that  38-41  is  a  later  insertion,  First  Three 
Gospels,  p.  210,  n.  i).  It  has  been  argued  (e.g.  by  Bousset)  that 
the  original  form  of  the  verse  is  best  preserved  in  Luke  xvii.  i,  2 
(Q).  Where  Mark  has  '  one  of  these  little  ones  who  believe,'  Luke 
has,  more  simply, '  one  of  these  little  ones.'  The  absolute  use  of 
iricrreva),  to  mean  the  Christian  believer,  is  secondary  and  late. 
Nevertheless  it  is  probable  that  Mark's  addition  is  a  correct 
interpretation.  Humble  adherents  and  believers  were  probably 
referred  to,  even  in  the  original,  not  children,  as  Holtzmann 
and  J.  Weiss  believe.  The  sin  condemned  is  that  of  seducing 
humble  believers  from  their  faith,  making  them  apostatise.  a-Kav- 
SaXa  and  aKavSaXi^ecv  are  expressive  words,  for  which,  as  W. 
points  out  (on  Matt.  xiii.  41),  there  is  no  precise  German  (or 
English)  equivalent.  '  Cause  to  stumble,'  '  seduce,'  &c.,  are  none 
of  them  quite  satisfactory  renderings  for  the  verb,  nor  will 
'stumbling-block'  do  well  for  the  noun. 

To  seduce  others  from  their  faith  is  the  greatest  of  sins.  The 
Kabbis  thought  the  same.  To  them  Jeroboam  was  the  type  of 
the  greatest  sinner,  because  he  not  only  did  evil  himself,  but 
'caused  Israel  to  sin.' 

43-47  are  connected  with  42  by  the  word  a-KavSaXi^eiv,  but 
deal  with  quite  a  different  subject.  The  temptations  here  referred 
to  are  not  brought  to  others,  but  occur,  through  the  weakness  of 
the  flesh,  to  oneself.  These  verses  are  perhaps  earlier  and  more 
authentic.  They  occur  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  (Matt. 
v.  29,  30)  as  well  as  in  Matt.  xviiL  8,  9.  B.  Weiss  thinks  that 
the  entire  section  about  'stumbling-blocks'  existed  in  Q  in  the 


232  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

order  in  which  we  find  it  in  Mark,  i.e.  Luke  xvii.  i,  2  was 
succeeded  by  Matt.  v.  29,  30.  Even  if  this  was  not  the  case,  it 
may  nevertheless  be  that  43-47  are  based  upon  Q. 

The  advice  which  Jesus  here  gives  is  clearly  not  to  be  taken 
literally.  But  the  form  of  the  maxims  rests  upon  the  conception 
— still  widely  prevalent — that  in  the  life  of  the  resurrection  a 
man's  outward  form  is  the  same  as  that  which  he  had  when  he 
died.  If  you  die  with  one  eye,  you  will  only  have  one  eye  when 
you  '  rise.' 

The  term  '  life '  is  used  as  equivalent  to  the  '  Kingdom  of  God.' 
It  has  a  somewhat  late  look  used  thus  absolutely :  the  term  is  not 
used  in  Matt.  v.  29,  30,  though  we  find  it  in  Matt.  vii.  14,  where 
it  is,  however,  used  in  contrast  to  '  destruction.'  Here  it  seems  to 
wear  almost  a  Johannine  air.  'The  fire  that  shall  never  be 
quenched'  seems  added  as  an  explanation  of  'Gehenna.' 

The  '  life,'  and  therefore  the  Kingdom,  are  thus  regarded  as 
future,  not  present.  When  were  the  hearers  of  these  maxims 
supposed  to  enter  the  Kingdom  ?  Apparently  after  death,  at  the 
resurrection,  when  Jesus  in  his  risen  glory,  appearing  upon  earth 
again,  would  admit  the  good  into  the  full  beatitude  of  the 
perfected  Kingdom,  and  send  the  bad  to  everlasting  helL 

The  advice  which  Jesus  here  gives  is  that  we  are  not  to 
provoke  danger  and  call  it  forth.  Far  better  to  nip  it  in  the 
bud,  and  to  pray,  'Lead  us  not  into  temptation.'  The  word 
'Gehenna'  only  occurs  here  in  Mark.  For  the  origin  and  Rab- 
binical use  of  the  word  see  Jewish  Encyclopoedia. 

48.  The  reference  is  to  Isaiah  Ixvi.  24.  The  worm  is  the 
decomposed  body,  which  is  to  continue  to  feel  pain,  and  to  be 
burned  with  constant  fire.  The  quotation,  wanting  in  Matthew, 
seems  to  be  added  here  only  in  order  to  make  a  verbal  connection 
for  the  following  verse.  '  That  the  reference  here  is  to  an  eternal 
fire  is  certain ;  whether  eternal  pain  for  the  condemned  is  thought 
of  or  connected  therewith  is  doubtful.'  So  J.  Weiss,  who  acUs, 
characteristically:  'This  is  the  foundation  passage  {Grundstelle) 
for  the  horrible  doctrine  of  the  everlasting  pains  of  hell,  a  doctrine 
which  is,  indeed,  consonant  with  the  outward  Jewish  dogma  of 
retribution,  but  not  with  the  gospel  of  the  God  whose  nature  is 
love.'  Yet  Christianity  has  made  much  greater  use  of  the  horrible 
doctrine  than  Judaism,  and  Judaism  has  freed  itself  from  it  more 
easily  and  completely  than  Christianity.  The  doctrine  of  divine 
forgiveness  is  so  fundamentally  Jewish  that  it  was  quite  easy  for 
Judaism  to  see  that  the  horrible  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment 
was  in  flagrant  violation  of  its  own  clearest  and  chiefest  teaching. 
It  is  amusing  to  think  that  from  the  Jewish  pulpit,  under  which 


IX.  33-So]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  233 

I  sat  for  many  years,  the  horrible  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment 
and  eternal  pain  was  habitually  referred  to  as  characteristically 
Christian.  So  apt  are  we  to  attribute  opinions  which  we  dislike 
to  our  neighbours !  It  is  needless  to  tell  my  Jewish  readers  that 
J.  Weiss's  words  are  merely  the  product  of  prejudice.  His 
scholarship  is,  I  hope,  reflected  in  what  follows,  which  I  trust  is 
true,  though  I  feel  extremely  doubtful.  'Happily,'  he  says,  'it 
is  very  unlikely  that  Jesus  himself  gave  any  occasion  (Anlass)  to 
this  horrible  doctrine.  For  the  judgment  of  fire,  according  to 
Jesus,  is  a  rapid  process,  which  leads  to  annihilation.  In  the 
Judgment  it  is  a  question  of  death  or  of  life.'     May  it  be  so ! 

49.  Many  attempts  have  been  made  to  connect  49  with  the 
preceding  passages,  but  they  have  not  been  very  successful.  The 
'  eternal  fire '  seems  to  have  suggested  the  idea  of  purification  by 
another  sort  of  fire. 

The  verse  has  been  taken  to  mean  that  everyone  must  be 
purified  by  the  fire  of  tribulation.  But  this  seems  somewhat 
strained.  Loisy  takes  it  to  be  a  sort  of  false  connecting  link 
between  48  and  50,  and  to  refer  to  the  final  crisis  of  the  world,  the 
universal  conflagration,  in  which  the  wicked  would  perish,  but 
which  the  just  would  pass  through  purified  and  unharmed  {E.  S. 
II.  p.  84).  Many  MSS.  add :  '  And  every  sacrifice  shall  be  salted 
with  salt,'  which  seems  to  mean  'jicst  as  every  sacrifice  is  purified 
(salted)  by  salt.' 

50.  This  verse,  again,  seems  merely  outwardly  hun^  on  to 
49.  Indeed,  the  two  halves  of  it  seem  to  have  been  originally 
independent.  For  the  first  half  cp.  Matt.  v.  1 3 ;  Luke  xiv.  34. 
The  salt  in  Mark,  as  in  Matthew  and  Luke,  is  meant  to  be  the 
disciples.  They  are  to  season  and  purify  the  world.  If  the 
purifpng  condiment  has  lost  its  purifying  quality,  its  environment 
cannot  freshly  season  or  purify  it.  The  hope  of  the  world  lies  in 
the  disciples :  if  they  become  proud  and  impure,  who  can  make 
them  pure  and  humble  ? 

The  second  half  of  the  verse  uses  the  metaphor  in  a  different 
way.  The  disciples  themselves  are  not  salt  (as  towards  the  world), 
but  they  are  to  have  salt  in  themselves,  and  to  be  at  peace  one 
with  another.  This  may  mean,  perhaps,  that  they  are  to  be  pure 
and  humble,  uncontaminated  by  the  soilure  of  the  world.  But 
perhaps  it  means  that  they  are  not  to  quarrel,  the  end  of  the  long 
section  returning  to  the  subject  with  which  it  opened  (33).  '  The 
compiler  of  the  discourse,  wanting  to  bring  Jewish  and  Greek 
Christianity  into  accord,  gives  to  the  former  counsels  of  goodwill 
and  charity '  {E.  8. 11.  p.  83). 


234  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [IX.  33-50 

With  regard  to  the  many  disconnected  sayings  in  the  last 
verses  of  this  chapter  W.  observes: 

'Very  characteristic  and  without  doubt  of  a  primary  nature 
in  order  of  time  are  the  isolated,  disconnected  and  paradoxical 
sayings  of  Jesus  in  Mark  ix.  48-50.  They  have  the  appearance 
of  undigested  morsels  {unverdaute  Brocken).  Yet  how  could 
Mark  have  wished  or  wanted  to  tear  them  out  of  their  context, 
and  thus  make  them  unintelligible,  if  in  his  time  they  had 
already  possessed  a  context?  It  was  only  later  on  that  they 
were  better  understood,  arranged,  and  brought  into  good  con- 
nection' {i.e.  in  Matthew  and  Luke  and,  before  them,  in  their 
special  source  Q  or  the  '  Redenquelle ').  Compare  also  W.'s 
remarks  in  his  Einleitung  on  p.  85.  The  same  argument,  with 
Bousset's  reply  to  it,  has  come  before  us  on  iv.  25.  And  here  it 
is  strongly  disputed  by  Loisy.  To  him  all  this  section  of  Mark 
presents  the  character  of  an  artificial  and  maladroit  compilation. 
Not  by  such  passages  can  one  prove  that  Mark  is  primitive 
relative  to  Q. 

CHAPTER  X 

I- 1 2.    Of  Divorce 
{Cp.  Matt.  xix.  1-12) 

1  And  he  arose  from  thence,  and  came  into  the  district  of  Judaea 
beyond  the  Jordan:  and  crowds  collected  unto  him  again;  and  he 
taught  them  again,  as  he  was  wont. 

2  And  the  Pharisees  came  and  asked  him,  in  order  to  test  him  : 

3  '  May  a  man  divorce  his  wife  ? '    And  he  answered  and  said  unto 

4  them,  '  What  did  Moses  command  you  ? '  And  they  said, '  Moses 
permitted  him  to  write  a  bill  of  divorce,  and  to  send  her  away.' 

5  And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  To  suit  the  hardness  of  your  hearts 

6  he  wrote  you  this  precept.    But  from  the  beginning  of  the  creation: 

7  He  made  them  male  and  female :  therefore  shall  a  man  leave  his 

8  father  and  mother,  and  cleave  to  his  wife ;  and  they  two  shall  be 

9  one  flesh :  so  then  they  are  no  more  two,  but  one  flesh.  What 
therefore  God  hath  joined  together,  let  not  man  separate.' 

10  And  in  the  house  his  disciples  asked  him  again  about  this 

1 1  matter.    And  he  said  unto  them, '  Whoever  divorces  his  wife,  and 

12  marries  another,  commits  adultery  against  her.  And  if  the  woman 
divorce  her  husband,  and  marry  another,  she  commits  adultery.' 


X.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  235 

This  passage  is  one  of  the  most  important  in  the  Gospels. 
In  no  other  point  was  the  opposition  of  Jesus  to  the  Rabbinic 
law  of  profounder  significance.  The  religious  position  of  woman 
and  the  law  of  divorce  form  the  least  attractive  feature  in  the 
Rabbinical  system.  If  the  general  status  of  women  among  the 
Jews  has,  nevertheless,  been  tolerably  satisfactory,  this  is  scarcely 
because  of  their  laws,  but  in  spite  of  them.  The  unerring  ethical 
instinct  of  Jesus  led  him  to  put  his  finger  upon  the  weak  spots  and 
sore  places  of  the  established  religion.  Of  all  such  weak  spots 
and  sore  places  this  was  the  weakest  and  the  sorest.  And  the 
weakest  and  sorest  it  still  remains.  The  reform,  or  rather  the 
renouncement,  of  the  Orientalisms  in  the  laws  about  women  is 
one  of  the  greatest  necessities  of  orthodox  Judaism.  Fast  bound 
in  the  bondage  of  a  code,  from  which  it  cannot  shake  itself  free 
without  losing  its  own  identity,  orthodox  Judaism  (like  other 
'  orthodox '  creeds)  is  in  a  difficult  and  unenviable  position.  On 
the  other  hand,  as  a  wise  friend  has  pointed  out  to  me,  it  is 
a  remarkable  fact  that  both  in  ancient  and  modern  orthodox 
Judaism  woman  has  often,  and  even  usually,  received  a  high  place 
of  honour.  It  has  been  held  that  the  duties  of  wifehood  and 
motherhood  were  in  themselves  sanctioned  and  sanctified  by  God, 
and  thus  rightly  dispensed  a  woman  from  many  ritual  enactments. 
Her  place  within  the  family  has  always  been  high  and  revered. 
'  Comparisons  are  odious,'  but  it  is  pretty  certain  that  among  the 
very  poor  the  Jewish  woman  is  not  less  honoured  in  her  home  than 
is  her  Gentile  neighbour  in  hers.  So  true  is  it,  as  Mr  Abrahams 
has  said,  that  'Judaism  is  the  great  upsetter  of  the  probable. 
Analyse  a  tendency  of  Judaism,  and  predict  its  logical  conse- 
quences, and  then  look  in  Judaism  for  consequences  quite  other 
tnan  these '  {Judaism,  p.  69). 

The  Rabbinic  law  of  divorce  starts  from  Deut.  xxiv.  i.  It  is, 
and  remains,  doubtful  what  the  verses  precisely  mean.  What 
is  the  '  unseemly  thing '  which  if  a  man  find  in  his  wife,  he  may 
divorce  her  ?  To  his  eternal  honour,  Shammai,  an  older  contem- 
porary of  Jesus,  said  it  meant,  and  only  meant,  unchastity.  But 
to  his  eternal  dishonour  Hillel  said  it  meant  all  kinds  of  other 
reasons  as  well.  The  Rabbinic  law  most  unfortunately  followed 
Hillel,  and  it  allowed,  and  still  allows,  divorce  for  many  and  many 
a  reason  over  and  above  and  outside  of  adultery.  See  Additional 
Note  18. 

Though  the  words  in  Deuteronomy  are  doubtful,  it  would 
seem  as  if  mere  adultery  could  not  be  the  only  meaning.  For 
by  the  Law  (Deut.  xxii.  22)  the  adulteress  was  to  be  put  to 
death. 

The  version  of  this  section  in  Mark  differs  in  important  respects 


236  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  1-12 

from  the  version  in  Matthew  (xix.  1-12).  In  Mark  the  question 
is  asked  quite  generally,  'May  a  man  divorce  his  wife?'  In  Matthew 
the  question  is, '  May  a  man  for  any  reason  divorce  her  ? '  In  other 
words,  the  question  there  is,  What  attitude  does  Jesus  take  up  on 
the  point  at  issue  between  Hillel  and  Shammai?  The  parallel 
passages  (Matt.  v.  31,  32;  Luke  xvL  18)  must  also  be  taken 
into  account. 

At  first  sight  it  might  seem  as  if  Mark  can  only  then  be  sup- 
posed to  give  the  more  original  and  accurate  report  of  what  Jesus 
really  said,  if  W.'s  interpretation  of  Mark  be  accepted.  That 
interpretation  robs  the  difference  between  Matthew  and  Mark  ot 
any  considerable  importance.  It  assumes  that  Jesus  did  not 
mean  to  say  that,  even  if  a  woman  had  committed  adultery,  she 
must  not  be  divorced,  and  that  in  the  lifetime  of  that  guilty 
woman  the  guiltless  husband  must  never  marry  again.  It  supposes 
that  adultery  was  not  in  question.  For  though  Shammai  held 
that  unchastity  ought  to  be  the  only  ground  for  divorce,  there  is 
no  reason  to  suppose  that  the  ordinary  custom  and  Jaw  from  the 
earliest  period  onward  had  not  been  in  accordance  with  the  opinion 
of  Hillel,  namely,  that  a  man  was  able  to  send  his  wife  away  for 
a  number  of  reasons  unconnected  with  unchastity.  Adultery  was 
a  separate  affair,  which  was  not  dealt  with  by  anything  so  mild  as 
a  mere  bill  of  divorce.  The  penalty  of  adultery  was  death.  See 
Additional  Note  18. 

On  this  view  the  discussion  in  Mark  must  be  supposed  to 
exclude  adultery,  though  it  does  not  mention  adultery.  Matthew, 
to  avoid  any  unclearness,  adds  words  which  make  adultery  the 
exception  to  the  general  canon  which  Jesus  lays  down.  Gould 
seems  to  agree  with  W. 

I.  '  He  arose  from  thence,'  i.e.  from  Capernaum.  See  ix.  33. 
It  is  assumed  that  a  period  has  just  elapsed  during  which  Jesus 
had  withdrawn  himself  from  the  people.  He  now  resumes  his 
public  teaching.  But  he  finally  leaves  Galilee.  Prof.  Bennett 
says:  'Jesus  left  Galilee,  and  crossing  the  Jordan  came  to  the 
eastern  districts  opposite  Judaea.  He  now  felt  safer  than  in 
Galilee.  The  eastern  borderlands  were  less  settled :  the  population 
was  largely  of  Gentiles,  and  was  more  directly  under  the  govern- 
ment of  Rome.  There  was  less  opportunity  for  official  persecution 
or  popular  fanaticism,  and  the  desert  offered  a  refuge  from  danger. 
Hence  Jesus  resumed  His  public  ministry '  (p.  144). 

Some  think  that  the  kuI  after  'lovSaia?  should  probably  be 
omitted.  So  in  the  MS.  D,  in  the  S.S.,  and  in  the  parallel  verse 
in  Matthew.  Persea  would  thus  be  described  as  '  the  Judsean  land 
beyond  Jordan.'    Others  think  that  Jesus  preached  first  in  Judsea, 


X.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  237 

then  in  '  PeraBa,'  whence  he  made  his  way  to  Jerusalem  for  the 
Passover. 

2.  The  MS.  D  and  the  S.S.  omit  'the  Pharisees,'  perhaps 
rightly.  Matthew  brought  them  in  according  to  his  wont,  and 
then  they  may  have  been  added  in  Mark. 

'In  order  to  test  him.'  What  does  this  mean?  Was  the 
question  asked  because  the  answer  was  anticipated?  Did  the 
questioners  want  Jesus  to  say  something  definitely  against  the 
Law?  So  Menzies  and  Loisy.  Perhaps  the  conversation  arose 
from  no  such  intention,  but  casually.  Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that 
the  words  'testing  him'  may  mean  no  more  than  that  they  wanted 
to  see  what  attitude  he  would  take  up  on  a  difficult  and  dis- 
puted subject.  So  Gould:  'testing  him.  This  was  a  test,  not  a 
temptation.' 

3.  Jesus  replies  to  the  question  by  grasping  the  nettle  boldly. 
He  asks.  What  did  Moses  order  upon  the  subject  ?  But,  as  Loisy 
has  pointed  out,  the  'Moses'  passage  he  meant  was  not  the  'Moses' 
passage  which  the  Pharisees  at  once  thought  of.  '  Les  Pharisiens 
tendaient  un  pifege  a  Jdsus,  maintenant  c'est  lui  qui  les  guette, 
et  il  est  s<ir  de  les  prendre'  {E.  S.  il.  p.  197).  In  Matthew  the 
arrangement  is  different. 

5.  The  expected  reply  having  been  given  to  his  question,  Jesus 
then  proceeds  to  state  that  the  '  command '  in  Deuteronomy  was 
only  given  in  view  of  the  Israelite  '  hardness  of  heart.'  '  a-K\rip6<! 
[here]  means  hard,  in  the  sense  of  rough  or  coarse,  rather  than 
unimpressible.  xapSCa  is  the  common  word  for  the  inner  man 
generally  in  the  New  Testament.  The  whole  word  [a-KXrjpoKapSia, 
'  hardness  of  heart ']  denotes  the  rude  nature  which  belongs  to  a 
primitive  civilisation'  (Gould). 

The  Mosaic  law  was  in  certain  cases  a  kind  of  second  best. 
The  highest  law  could  not,  or  would  not,  have  been  obeyed.  So 
there  was  a  concession  made  to  human  weakness  or  '  hardness.' 
The  divorce  enactment  was  not  a  law,  but  a  dispensation.  This  is 
a  fine  interpretation  of  much  of  the  Mosaic  law,  and  may  be  com- 
pared with  Maimonides's  view  of  sacrifice.  Both  are  equally  un- 
historical,  though,  from  a  sort  of  universal  or  world-historic  point 
of  view,  one  can  see  that  Jesus  was  in  the  right. 

6.  Jesus  now  proceeds,  as  it  were,  to  correct  Moses  by  Moses. 
The  fundamental  law  of  marriage  is  not  destroyed  by  the  dispen- 
sation of  divorce.  That  was  a  temporary  concession,  and  has  no 
validity  or  meaning  for  the  true  children  of  God.  The  right 
translation  of  6  is  doubtful.     W.  takes  the  first  three  Greek 


238  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  1-12 

words  to  equal  '  In  the  beginning  of  Genesis '  (i.e.  the  first  book  of 
the  Pentateuch).  After  these  words  he  supposes  that  one  must 
supply,  '  Moses  wrote.'  Thus  one  gets :  '  In  the  creation  story, 
however,  (Moses  wrote) :  Male  and  female,'  &c. 

The  ordinary  translation  is  given  in  the  Authorised  and 
Revised  Versions:  'But  from  the  beginning  of  the  creation, 
male  and  female  made  he  them.'  In  either  case,  from  'he 
made'  down  to  'one  flesh'  is  a  citation  by  Jesus  from  Genesis. 

9.  Marriage  is  the  highest  unity.  Man  and  wife  are  one 
flesh.  One  flesh  by  divine  decree.  Monogamy  is  assumed,  as 
in  Genesis. 

(This  unity,  on  W.'s  hypothesis,  can  be  broken  by  adultery, 
but  in  no  other  way  whatsoever.) 

What,  then,  God  has  so  joined  together  man  has  no  right  to 
sunder  (cp.  i  Cor.  vii.  10). 

The  '  man '  who  sunders  would  be  the  husband  when  he  gives 
the  letter  of  divorce.  But  those  who  would  attempt  to  reply  to 
Jesus  by  asserting  the  divineness  of  the  Pentateuchal  law,  would 
doubtless  urge  that  it  is  not  man  who  sunders,  but  God;  for  it 
God,  through  Moses,  gave  the  command,  it  is  God  who  permits 
and  sanctions  the  sundering  divorce.  Nowhere  more  thstn  here 
does  Jesus  go  nearer  to  denying  the  absolute  divinity,  permanence 
and  perfection  of  the  Law.  Yet  one  can  see  that  he  was  not 
himself  conscious  of  doing  so.  Or,  at  any  rate,  the  theory  of  the 
hard  heart  was  devised  to  soften  the  blow,  to  preserve  the  inspira- 
tion of  the  Law,  while  at  the  same  time  maintaining  its  ethical 
inadequacy. 

10-12.  As  in  vii.  18,  Jesus  gives  a  further  explanation  to  the 
disciples  privately.  These  two  verses  have  therefore  to  be  put  on 
the  same  level  as  the  explanations  of  the  '  sower '  and  of  spiritual 
defilement.  Nevertheless  the  saying  they  enshrine  may  be  old 
and  authentic  in  substance.  One  need  not  be  troubled  by  'the 
house,'  or  ask  whose  house  it  was.  It  may  well  be  the  house 
where  Jesus  was  staying  at,  the  particular  place  where  he  then 
happened  to  be. 

A  saying  about  divorce  is  also  found  in  Matt.  v.  32  (Sermon 
on  the  Mount)  and  in  Luke  xvi.  18.  It  may  be,  as  Loisy  says, 
that  Mark  has  drawn  his  saying  from  the  same  source  whence 
Matthew  and  Luke  drew  theirs  (i.e.  Q).  It  may  also  be,  as  he  also 
suggests,  that,  in  better  conformity  with  its  environment,  the 
saying  is  a  traditional  gloss  on  8  and  9,  which  sought  to  complete 
the  teaching  of  Jesus  by  that  of  Paul.  '  Le  caract^re  pratique  de 
cette  glose  lui  aurait  valu  d'entrer,  avec  adaptation  au  jud^o- 
christianisme,  dans  une  rt^daction  secondaire  du  recueil  de  discours 


X.  1-12]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  239 

oil  Matthieu  et  Luc  I'auraient  connue'  (E.  S.  11.  p.  199).  Aa 
argument  in  favour  of  the  first  hypothesis  would  be  that  of  all 
the  four  forms  in  which  the  prohibition  of  divorce  appears  in  the 
Synoptics,  that  of  Luke  seems  the  most  original.     See  below. 

II.  In  II  and  12  Jesus  adds  something  new.  To  divorce 
your  wife  is  a  sin,  but  that  sin  is  not  adultery.  If,  however,  in 
addition  to  divorcing  her,  you  marry  another  woman,  then  to  the 
sin  of  divorce  you  add  the  fresh  sin  of  adultery.  But  Harnack 
does  not  think  that  this  distinction  between  (a)  the  sin,  which  is 
not  adultery,  of  divorce,  and  (6)  the  sin,  which  is  adultery,  of  divorce 
pliis  remarriage,  is  intended  by  Mark.  He  says  (a)  this  view 
contradicts  the  context  of  1-9,  (b)  is  artificially  introduced  into 
the  wording  of  the  passage,  and  (c)  ignores  the  fact  that  in 
Oriental  life  remarriage  regularly  followed  divorce. 

fioixo-rai  e7r'  aiiTrjv,  he  commits  adultery  in  respect  of  his  first 
wife.  The  assertion  of  adultery  following  on  divorce  occurs  four 
times  in  the  Synoptics,  but  in  each  of  the  four  passages  there  are 
varieties  in  detail.  Mark  predicates  adultery  (a)  of  the  man,  who 
having  divorced  one  woman,  marries  another,  (6)  of  the  woman, 
who  having  divorced  (or  being  divorced  from)  her  husband, 
marries  again.  Matt.  v.  32  predicates  adultery  (a)  of  the  woman, 
who  being  divorced,  marries  again,  (b)  of  the  man  who  marries  a 
divorced  woman.  [Mark's  second  case  is  the  same  as  Matthew's 
first  case,  though  Matthew  assigns  the  evil  to  the  man  who  by  his 
action  causes  the  woman  to  sin.]  Matt.  xix.  predicates  adultery 
(a)  of  the  man,  who  having  divorced  one  woman,  marries  another, 
and  there  is  no  second  case  (6)  mentioned.  Finally,  Luke  predi- 
cates adultery  (a)  of  the  man,  who  having  divorced  his  wife, 
marries  another,  and  (6)  of  the  man  who  marries  a  divorced 
woman.  There  are  thus  three  different  cases,  A,  B  and  G: — two 
in  which  adultery  is  predicated  of  men  {^A  and  B),  and  one  in 
which  adultery  is  predicated  of  woman  (C).  Mark  has  A  and  G, 
Matt.  v.  has  G  and  B,  Matt.  xix.  has  A,  Luke  has  A  and  B. 
The  case  of  the  woman  is  mentioned  twice ;  the  case  of  the  man 
divorcing  and  marrying  again  thrice ;  the  case  of  the  man  marrying 
a  divorced  woman  twice.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  B.  Weiss  is 
probably  right.  The  oldest  and  most  original  form  of  the  saying 
is  Luke's.  Jesus  spoke  to  men,  and  where  women  are  not 
specially  before  him,  it  is  probable  that  he  would  allude  to  man's 
sin  rather  than  to  woman's.  Moreover,  it  is  man  who  divorces,  and 
it  is  man's  divorcing  that  Jesus  blames  and  would  stop.  Hence  it 
seems  likely  that  he  should  predicate  adultery  for  each  remarrying 
possibility,  i.e.  whether  you  yourself  divorce  and  then  marry 
another  woman,  or  whether  another  man  having  divorced,  you 


240  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  i-i2 

marry  the  divorced  wife.  If  B.  Weiss  is  right,  the  first  hypothesis  of 
Loisy's  becomes  the  more  probable,  and  the  divorce  passage  in  Q 
(the  form  of  which  was  Luke  xvi.  i8  rather  than  Matt.  v.  32) 
is  probably  older  than  Mark.  Holtzmann  says  cautiously  that 
Luke's  version  is  either  a  happy  combination  of  Matt.  x.  32  with 
Mark  x.  11    oder— das  Ursprungliche.' 

12.  The  preceding  verse  is  clear  and  intelligible.  But  the 
1 2th,  according  to  the  usual  and  most  authorised  text,  gives  rise 
to  great  difficulties.  It  says:  'And  if  the  woman  divorce  her 
husband,  and  marry  another,  she  commits  adultery.' 

But,  according  to  Jewish  law,  the  woman  could  not  divorce 
the  man.  It  is  this  disparity  which  is  the  second  great  blot  and 
evil  of  the  Jewish  law  of  divorce.  The  woman,  in  true  accordance 
with  Oriental  conceptions,  is  the  subordinate  of  the  man.  The 
Jewish  law — to  its  credit  be  it  said — made  some  improvements 
in  her  insecure  and  unequal  position;  but  she  remained,  and 
remains,  religiously  and  legally,  the  inferior.  Her  husband  can 
divorce  her  even  if  she  has  not  committed  adultery;  she  cannot 
divorce  him  even  though  he  has  committed  adultery. 

In  these  circumstances  it  seems  inconceivable  that  Jesus  could 
have  made  a  statement  so  inconsistent  with  Jewish  law  and  life. 
It  is  hardly  likely  that  Mark  could  have  written  such  a  statement 
(as  to  I  Cor.  viL  13,  Paul  often  writes  as  if  he  had  never  been 
familiar  with  the  Jewish  religion).  But  the  important  MS.  D 
(Codex  Bezse),  upon  which  W.  so  often  relies,  reads  xal  idv  yvv^ 
i^eXOrj  diro  tow  avSpoi  Koi  aWov  ya/Mtjar} :  i.e.  If  a  woman  is 
divorced  from  her  husband  and  marries  another  man,  she  commits 
adultery.  W.  thinks  this  reading  the  original.  Thus  the  man  and 
the  woman  are  put  by  Jesus,  so  far  as  he  could,  upon  an  equality. 
If  the  divorced  woman  marries  again,  she  commits  adultery  as 
well  as  the  man.  If  this  reading  is  correct,  it  is  then  certain  that 
the  case  of  the  woman  who  had  already  committed  adultery  must 
be  excluded.  For  if  she  had  been  divorced  for  adultery,  it  would 
not  be  said  that  she  commits  adultery  if  she  marry  again.  If  the 
usual  reading  is  retained,  we  must  explain,  with  Menzies  and  others, 
that '  Mark,  writing  for  Gentile  readers,  with  whom  the  wife  can 
claim  divorce  as  well  as  the  husband,  adds  a  sentence  to  meet  the 
case.'     Cp.  First  Three  Gospels,  p.  220. 

Thus  Jesus  breaks  away  from  and  condemns  the  prevailing 
and  dominant  Jewish  law  of  divorce.  He  associates  himself  with 
Shammai  in  asserting  the  inviolability  of  marriage  except  where 
the  woman  has  committed  adultery.  And  he  goes  further  than 
Shammai,  because  he  says  that  not  only  should  it  be  forbidden 
for  a  man  to  divorce  his  wife  except  for  adultery,  but  that  if  he 


X.  I-I2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  241 

doeB  so,  and  if  either  he  or  his  wife  marry  again,  both  he  and  she 
are  themselves  guilty  of  adultery. 

But  there  is  another  interpretation  of  x.  11,  12,  which  holds 
that  the  qualification  made  by  Matthew, '  except  for  unchastity,' 
misrepresents  the  Master's  teaching.  According  to  this  interpre- 
tation Jesus  rejects  all  divorce,  whether  for  adultery  or  for  any 
other  cause  whatever. 

One  cogent  argument  against  W.'s  view  of  our  passage  is  that, 
when  Jesus  lived,  adultery  was  in  all  probability  no  longer 
punished  by  death.  The  harsh  law  of  the  Pentateuch  had  already 
fallen  into  desuetude.  If  a  woman  committed  adultery  she  was, 
in  all  probability,  no  longer  killed,  but  given  a  bill  of  divorce. 

If  this  be  really  so,  then  Jesus  may  consciously  have  included 
adultery  as  one  of  the  reasons  which  do  not  justify  divorce.  He 
may  have  meant  to  urge  that  the  marriage  bond  is  inviolable. 
The  one  flesh  can  never  be  made  two.  This  is  the  interpretation 
which  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  has  given  to  his  words.  See 
further  the  note  on  Matt.  v.  32. 

Prof.  Burkitt  holds  that  there  is  a  special  allusion  to  a  special 
case  in  x.  12.  The  exact  wording  of  the  text  may  not  represent 
what  Jesus  said,  because  a  woman,  according  to  Jewish  law,  cannot 
divorce  her  husband.  But  suppose  the  words  ran  more  like  this : 
'If  a  woman  leaves  her  husband  and  marries  another,  she  commits 
adultery.'  Such  a  case  had  happened.  Herodias  had  left  her  first 
husband,  Herod  (erroneously  called  Philip  in  Mark  vi.  17),  in  order 
to  marry  his  half-brother  Antipas.  Prof  Burkitt  supposes  that 
this  famous  case  was  alluded  to  by  Jesus  (op.  cit.  pp.  98-101). 

The  Syriac  version  puts  the  woman  before  the  man ;  it  reads : 
'The  woman  who  leaves  her  husband  and  becomes  the  wife  of 
another  does  indeed  commit  adultery,  and  that  man  who  leaves 
his  wife  and  takes  another  does  indeed  commit  adultery.'  Here 
the  man  and  woman  are  put  on  the  same  level.  And  the  doctrine 
of  the  one  flesh  may  be  taken  to  imply  that  the  same  conduct 
which  is  invalid  and  wicked  and  illegitimate  in  a  woman  is  invalid 
and  wicked  and  illegitimate  in  the  case  of  a  man.  If  a  woman 
cannot  and  may  not  divorce  or  leave  her  husband,  a  man  cannot 
and  may  not  divorce  his  wife.  This  reading  of  the  Syriac  version 
is  in  accordance  with  the  reading  of  the  MS.  D,  quoted  above,  and 
is  accepted  by  Jiilicher.    Compare  the  note  on  Matt.  xix.  8. 

Mr  Allen  holds  that  the  text  of  Mark  is  logical,  consistent, 
and  defensible  as  it  stands.  It  is  true  that  '  no  woman  could 
divorce  her  husband  by  Jewish  law.  But  that  is  no  reason  why 
the  Lord  should  not  have  expressed  Himself  as  Mark  records. 
There  were  exceptional  csises  of  divorce  by  women  in  Palestine. 
Cp.  Salome,  Josephus,  Ant.  book  xv.  ch.  vii.  10:  "She  sent  him 

M.  16 


242  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X-  1-12 

(Costobar)  a  bill  of  divorce,  though  this  was  against  the  Jewish 
law  (and  dissolved  her  marriage  with  him)."  And  there  is  no 
reason  why  He  may  not  have  been  acquainted  with  the  possibility 
of  divorce  by  women  in  the  West,  or  why,  even  if  He  had  not 
this  in  view,  He  may  not  have  emphasised  His  point  by  stating 
the  wrongfulness  of  divorce  on  either  side  of  the  marriage  tie.' 

If  Jesus  absolutely  forbade  divorce,  he  went  further  than  most 
of  us  can  follow  him.  We  may  even  hold  that  the  rigid  interpre- 
tation of  his  words  has  been  productive  of  grave  evils.  But  we 
shall  cherish  his  championship  of  womanhood.  He  does  seem  to 
have  felt  that  woman  had  been  hardly  dealt  with,  and  that  she 
should  not  be  treated  more  harshly  than  man.  The  exquisite 
story  of  the  woman  taken  in  adultery  in  John  viiL  l-l  i  seems  to 
touch  a  similar  note.  The  story  is  out  of  keeping  with  the  rest 
of  the  Johannine  gospel,  and  ought  to  have  found  a  place  in  the 
Synoptics.  In  spite  of  its  small  MS.  authority,  and  of  the  fact 
that  it  is  only  found  in  John,  it  may  possibly  be  historical.  And 
here  we  seem  to  find  Jesus,  not  condoning  or  belittling  sin,  but 
yet  nobly  unwilling  that  the  woman  should  be  singled  out  for 
scorn  and  punishment. 

13-16.    Jesus  and  the  Children  .  1 

{Cp.  Matt,  xviii.  3,  xix.  13-IS;  Luke  xviii.  15-17) 

13        And  they  brought  young  children  to  him,  for  him  to  touch 

X4  them :  and  his  disciples  rebuked  those  that  brought  them.    But 

when  Jesus  saw  it,  he  was  indignant,  and  he  said  unto  them, '  Let 

the  little  children  come  unto  me,  and  prevent  them  not :  for  of 

15  such  is  the  kingdom  of  God.     Verily  I  say  unto  you,  Whoever 
shall  not  receive  the  kingdom  of  God  as  a  little  child,  he  shall 

16  surely  not  enter  therein.'    And  he  embraced  them  and  blessed 
them,  putting  his  hands  upon  them. 

A  touching  section,  the  humanity  and  grace  of  which  are 
marred  by  Matthew.  Like  the  passage  about  divorce,  it  has  no 
relation  with  its  context.  We  have  seen  that  there  is  a  certain 
parallel  to  a  part  of  this  section  in  Mark  ix.  36.  Verse  15  has 
its  parallel  in  Matt,  xviii.  3.  In  this  place  Matthew  omits  it. 
Whether  this  implies  that  the  dispute  as  to  precedence  (Marl? 
ix.  33)  did  really  include  in  its  earliest  form  the  incident  of  Jesus 
putting  a  child  before  the  disciples  (ix.  36)  and  then  saying  to 
them  what  we  now  read  in  x.  15  and  Matt,  xviii.  3,  I  will  not 


X.  I3-I6]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  243 

attempt  to  decide.  Such  is  the  opinion  of  B.  Weiss.  It  is 
conceivable  that  Matt,  xviii.  3  (Q)  is  the  source  of  Mark  x.  15, 
but  it  does  not  appear  to  be  one  of  the  most  likely  of  these 
supposed  borrowings  of  Mark  from  Q.  It  does  not  seem  to  me 
impossible  that  the  child  of  ix.  36  and  the  children  of  x.  13  may 
both  be  historic.  W.  argues  that  the  human  traits  of  x.  13-16 
prove  its  priority  to  the  variant  ix.  35-37,  but  it  does  not  seem  to 
be  quite  necessary  to  assume  that  the  two  passages  are  variants 
at  all. 

13.  Gp.  2  Kings  iv.  27.  Is  there  a  magical  element  about 
the  Master's  mere  '  touch '  which  is  unsympathetic  to  Matthew  ? 
With  him  the  touch  is  turned  into  Jesus  putting  his  hands  upon 
their  heads.  But  probably  Mark  meant  by  'touching'  what 
Matthew  has  said  {cp.  verse  16).  Putting  the  hand  upon  the 
person's  head  was  a  regular  accompaniment  of  the  act  of  blessing 
{cp.  Genesis  xlviii.  14).  It  is  reasonable  enough  to  suppose  that 
Jesus  was  genuinely  fond  of  children.  At  the  same  time  there 
is  here,  as  so  constantly  in  all  the  stories  about  him,  the  curious 
parallel  with,  or  contrast  to,  the  stories  of  Elijah  and  Elisha. 
Compare  Mark  x.  13-16  with  2  Bangs  ii.  23.  See  also  Additional 
Note  19. 

14.  'Of  such,'  Twv  Toiovrav.  Does  Jesus  refer  to  real  children 
too  ?  Loisy  thinks  he  does,  as  well  as  to  those  who  have  a  pure, 
child-like  mind.  The  indignation  shown  or  felt  by  Jesus  is 
mentioned  by  Mark  only.  The  earliest  Evangelist  is  not  afraid 
or  unwilling  to  indicate  that  the  Master  was  a  man,  who  could 
be  moved  by  strong  emotions.  Dr  Carpenter  says :  '  The  Jesus 
of  Mark  is  a  man  with  a  man's  wrath  and  disappointment.... 
The  leading  outlines  of  the  immortal  story  are  drawn  from  the 
life.'  For  '  it  remains  probable  that  the  main  facts  of  Mark  were 
derived  from  Peter.'  In  Mark,  far  more  than  in  Matthew  and 
Luke,  'Jesus  thinks,  prays,  feels,  speaks,  acts,  as  a  man  '  (First 
Three  Gospels,  pp.  217,  231). 

The  child  symbolizes  or  represents  the  temper  in  which  the 
Kingdom  must  be  received.  Humble  trust,  a  complete  lack  of 
asaertiveness,  no  consciousness  of  '  merit '  or  desert,  simple  con- 
fidence and  purity — these  are  the  qualities  which  Jesus  means  to 
indicate  in  the  character  of  the  true  child.  The  Kingdom  can 
only  be  entered  by  those  who  can  approach  it  in  such  a  spirit. 
To  those  who  have  it,  the  highest  good,  as  the  direct  gift  and 
grace  of  God,  can  and  will  be  given. 

W.  points  out  most  aptly  how  Shakespeare  has  felt  the  con- 
trast between  this  section  and  the  section  which  follows  it.     For 

16 — 2 


244  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X-  i3-i6 

here  the  Kingdom  is  a  gift  which  one  must  accept  as  a  child,  there 
it  is  only  to  be  won  by  effort  and  self-denial. 

The  passage  from  Shakespeare  occurs  in  the  famous  soliloquy 
of  Kichard  II.  just  before  his  death  (Act  V.  scene  v.) : 

...No  thought  is  contented.     The  better  sort, 

As  thoughts  of  things  divine,  are  intermixed 

With  scruples,  and  do  set  the  word  itself 

Against  the  word: 

As  thus,  'Come,  little  ones,'  and  then  again, 

'It  is  as  hard  to  come  as  for  a  camel 

To  thread  the  postern  of  a  small  needle's  eye.' 

15.  Are  we  to  assert  that  the  Eangdom  is  present,  because 
the  text  speaks  of  receiving  it  as  a  child  ?  The  second  part  of  the 
verse  shows  that  this  would  be  an  error.  As  Wrede  points  out, 
the  passage  means  that  he  who  has  not  the  childlike  mind  at  the 
time  when  the  Kingdom  arrives  will  not  be  suflfered  to  enter  it. 
Loisy,  however,  says :  '  The  Kingdom  of  God  does  not  here  refer 
exclusively  to  the  Parousia,  still  less  to  the  preaching  of  the  gospel, 
but  rather  to  the  scheme  of  salvation  in  its  entirety.  Hence  it  is 
possible  to  say  that  a  person  receives  the  Kingdom  and  that  he 
enters  into  it :  "  to  receive "  better  suits  the  preaching  of  the 
gospel  and  the  divine  grace  which  gives  it;  "to  enter"  looks 
rather  to  the  eternal  felicity  to  which  the  righteous  will  be 
admitted.  To  receive  the  Kingdom  is  properly  speaking  to 
accept  the  announcement  of  it  with  the  faith  and  the  sentiments 
which  are  fitting '  {E.  S.  II.  p.  205). 

16.  evayKa\i(rdfievo<!  is  peculiar  to  Mark.  Cp.  ix.  36.  But 
by  W.,  as  we  have  seen,  Mark  x.  13-16  is  regarded  as  more 
original  than  ix.  36,  where  a  single  child  is  placed  for  didactic 
purposes  before  the  disciples,  as  a  sort  of  concrete,  though  symboUc, 
example  of  the  'little  ones  who  believe.'  xarevXayei.  The  word 
is  only  found  here  in  the  N.T.  '  The  force  of  Kara  seems  to  be 
intensive — He  blessed  them  fervently,  in  no  perfunctory  way,  but 
with  emphasis,  as  those  who  were  capable  of  a  more  unreserved 
benediction  than  their  elders.  Instead  of  the  mere  touch  for 
which  their  friends  had  asked,  He  laid  his  hands  on  them'  (Swete). 

The  picture  of  Jesus  embracing  and  blessing  the  children  has 
rightly  sunk  deep  into  the  human  heart.  It  would  be  unjust  to 
contrast  with  it,  as  has  sometimes  been  done,  the  picture  of 
2  Kings  ii.  23.  For  in  the  one  the  children  are  brought  to  Jesus 
to  be  taught;  in  the  other  they  mock  at  the  prophet  on  the 
road.  Yet  the  beauty,  the  significance,  the  ethical  force  and  the 
originality  of  the  Gospel  story,  as  of  the  great  saying  in  1 5,  can 
also  only  with  injustice  be  overlooked,  cheapened,  or  denied. 


X.  17-31]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  245 


17-31.    The  Danger  of  Kiches — Wealth  and  the 
Kingdom 

(Op.  Matt.  xix.  16-30;   Luke  xviii.  18-30) 

17  And  as  he  set  forth  upon  his  way,  one  ran  up,  and  knelt 
and  asked  him,  '  Good  Master,  what  shall  I  do  that  I  may  inherit 

18  eternal  life  ? '    And  Jesus  said  unto  him,  '  Why  callest  thou  me 

19  good  ?  no  one  is  good  except  God  alone.  Thou  knowest  the  com- 
mandments. Do  not  commit  adultery.  Do  no  murder.  Do  not  steal, 
Do  not  bear  false  witness.  Defraud  not.  Honour  thy  father  and 

20  mother.'     And   he   said  unto   him,   '  Master,   all   these   have   I 

21  observed  from  my  youth.'  Then  Jesus  looked  at  him,  and  felt 
love  for  him,  and  said  unto  him, '  One  thing  thou  lackest :  go  thy 
way,  sell  whatsoever  thou  hast,  and  give  it  to  the  poor,  and  thou 

22  shalt  have  treasure  in  heaven :  and  come,  follow  me.'  But  he  was 
sad  at  that  saying,  and  went  away  grieved:  for  he  had  great 
possessions. 

23  And  Jesus  looked  round  about,  and  said  unto  his  disciples, 
'  How  difficult  is  it  for  them  who  have  riches  to  enter  the  kingdom 

25  of  God !     It  is  easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a 

24  needle  than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  the  kingdom  of  God.'  And 
the  disciples  were  astonished  at  his  words.  But  Jesus  spoke  again 
and  said  unto  them, '  Children,  how  difficult  it  is  to  enter  into  the 

26  kingdom  of  God!'     And  they  were  appalled  beyond  measure, 

27  saying  among  themselves, '  Who  then  can  be  saved  ? '  But  Jesus, 
looking  at  them,  said, '  For  men  it  is  impossible,  but  not  for  God : 
since  for  God  all  things  are  possible.' 

28  Then  Peter  began  to  say  unto  him,  'Lo,  we  have  abandoned  all, 

29  and  have  followed  thee.'  And  Jesus  answered  and  said, '  Verily  I 
say  unto  you,  there  is  no  man  who  hath  abandoned  house,  or 
brethren,  or  sisters,  or  father,  or  mother,  or  children,  or  lands,  for 

30  my  sake,  and  the  gospel's,  who  shall  not  receive  back  an  hundred- 
fold: now  in  this  age,  houses,  and  brethren,  and  sisters,  and 
mothers,  and  children,  and  lands,  though  with  persecutions ;  and 

31  in  the  world  to  come  eternal  life.    But  many  that  are  now  first 
i    shall  be  last;  and  the  last  first.' 


246  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  17-31 

'L'anecdote  du  riche  a  dt  ^tre  conserv^e  pour  elle-m|rae  kh 
tradition,  sans  attache  sp6ciale  au  voyage  de  Jud^e.  Marc  la 
plac^e  en  cet  endroit  pour  remplir  le  cadre  qu'il  a  ouvert  au 
ministfere  de  J^sus  en  P^r^e'  {E.  S.  II.  p.  207). 

17.  That  which  in  ix.  43  had  been  called  simply  '  life '  is  here 
called  •  eternal  life.'  Both  are  equivalent  to,  and  identical  with, 
the  Kingdom  of  God  (ix.  47  and  x.  14,  15).  Here,  once  more,  the 
Kingdom  is  something  which  man  must  seek  to  inherit,  and  can 
inherit,  by  his  own  right-doing.     Cp.  the  note  on  x.  14. 

18.  The  reply  of  Jesus  is  of  the  utmost  significance.  It  is 
obvious  that  no  divine  being  would  or  could  have  answered  thus. 
Jesus  knew  himself  to  be  a  man.  The  verse  is  naturally  extremely 
inconvenient  to  orthodox  Christian  commentators  who  think  that 
Jesus  was  God  or  was  divine.  It  is  interesting  to  see  how  they  deal 
with  it.  It  appears  that  one  traditional  way  out  is  to  say  that  'Jesus, 
as  often,  answers  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  questioner.'  So 
Schanz,  the  capable  Roman  Catholic  commentator,  who  honestly 
insists  on  the  correct  translation  of  the  verse,  but  adds  that  the 
words  do  not  exclude  '  dass  Jesus  seiner  hoheren  Natur  nach  selbst 
zu  diesem  gottlichen  Wesen  gehoren  kann.'  It  is  pleasant  to  know 
that  Jesus  was  a  better  and  purer  monotheist  than  Schanz  would 
have  him  to  be.  Even  Mr  Allen,  though  he  honestly  acknowledges 
that  the  changes  in  Matthew  are  '  probably  intentional,'  says  that 
the  meaning  in  Mark  '  seems  to  be :  Why  go  out  of  your  way  to 
call  one  whom  you  regard  as  a  human  teacher  good  ? '  W.  Wagner 
has  contributed  an  interesting  article  upon  the  exegesis  of  the 
verse  to  the  Zeitschrift  fur  die  neutestamentliche  Wissenschafi, 
1907,  pp.  143-161.  Wagner  himself  strongly  urges  that  'good' 
to  both  questioner  and  respondent  means,  not '  morally  perfect,' 
or  'sinless,'  but  beneficent,  'gutig.'  Thus  Jesus  has  not  denied 
his  sinlessness  or  moral  perfection  in  this  passage !  It  is  only  the 
quality  of  '  beneficence '  which  he  reserves  for  God  and  refuses  for 
himself !  (Gp.  also  what  Spitta  says  in  the  same  Zeitschrift,  1908, 
pp.  12-20,  who  presses  certain  details  in  the  order  of  the  narrative 
in  Luke,  and  its  relation  with  what  immediately  precedes  it.)  It 
may  indeed  be  true  that  'good'  means  here,  as  W.,  too,  says, 
rather  beneficent  than  sinless,  but  surely  the  historic  Jesus  would 
have  been  equally  disconcerted  at  the  idea  of  sinless  moral  per- 
fection being  ascribed  to  him.  The  simplest  meaning  that  can  be 
attached  to  the  word  '  good '  is  also  the  truest.  Jesus  meant  no 
more  and  no  less  than  what  any  unsophisticated  and  unprejudiced 
reader  would  understand  him  to  mean.  '  Merit  lives  from  man  to 
man.'     Only  God  is  good  in  the  sense  of  faultless.     If  Jesus  was 


X.  I7-3I]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  247 

in  the  human  sense  '  good,'  he  was  also  humble,  and  where,  in  the 
Gospel  narratives,  he  is  represented  as  least  humble,  he  seems  least 
good.  The  divine  being  may  know  himself  sinless ;  a  man  can  only 
sin  in  fancying  that  he  is  without  sin.  We  know  too  little  of  Jesus 
to  describe  his  character  fully;  his  eulogistic  biographers  do  not 
allow  anything  which  seems  to  them  a  fault  to  obscure  their  hero. 
The  invectives  of  Jesus  against  his  opponents  and  those  who 
differed  from  him  in  religious  opinion  are  to  his  biographers 
wholly  admirable.  We  shall  judge  otherwise.  Yet  it  is  a  noble 
character  that  peeps  through  the  fragmentary  and  one-sided 
records — ^none  the  less  noble  because  we  may  be  sure  that  of 
Jesus,  both  in  fact  and  in  his  own  estimate  of  himself,  the  adage 
Avas  true :  '  there  is  no  man  that  sinneth  not.' 

19.  The  order  of  the  commandments  seems  strange.  No  less 
so  that  'thou  shalt  not  covet'  is  omitted,  and  'thou  shalt  not 
defraud'  put  in  its  place.  But  the  S.S.  omits  'thou  shalt  not 
defraud,'  which  appears  to  be  not  original.  It  is  perhaps  specially 
introduced  as  suitable  for  a  rich  person. 

Over  and  above  the  order  of  the  commandments,  the  entire 
reply  of  Jesus  is  strange.  An  enumeration  of  merely  negative 
commandments,  even  though  they  form  part  of  the  famous  Ten, 
is  unusual  with  him.  He  is  keen  to  avoid  the  negative  morality, 
the  mere  avoidance  of  wrong,  which  is  one  of  the  dangers  of 
legalism.  If  he  had  replied  by  quoting  Deut.  vi.  5,  Leviticus  xix.  18, 
it  would  have  seemed  more  natural.  Did  he  mean  to  indicate  that 
he  was  no  bringer  of  a  new  morality  ?  The  old  commandments 
were  good  enough  for  men's  salvation  if  only  they  were  followed  ? 
For  I  think  W.  is  right  in  saying  that,  in  spite  of  21,  Jesus  meant 
what  he  said ;  he  meant  that  a  faithful  observance  of  '  the  com- 
mandments'  was  enough  to  secure  'eternal  life.'  Yet  19,  so 
interpreted,  would  scarcely  seem  consistent  with  the  inadequacy 
of  the  old  commandments  as  proclaimed  in  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount. 

20.  Some  MSS.  read,  i(f>v\a^d/i'rjv,  i.e.  'I  have  kept  myself 
from  doing  these  things ' ;  if  this  is  right,  we  may  suppose  that  the 
command  '  Honour  thy  parents '  has  been  interpolated.  Some 
read,  6^v\af a,  '  I  have  observed.' 

The  man  is  disappointed.  He  had  expected  Jesus  to  say 
something  new.  Moreover,  though  he  has  kept  the  ordinary 
Commandments,  he  does  not  feel  by  any  means  sure  that  he  has 
'deserved,'  or  that  he  will  attain,  eternal  life.  He  is  conscious  that 
he  has  done  nothing  out  of  the  common.  He  has  made  no  great 
or  special  effort.      He  ought  to  do  something  more  if  he  is  to 


248  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPKLS  P-  i7-3i 

obtain  the  great  gift  or  guerdon.    To  know  what  this  something 
more  should  be  he  comes  to  ask  Jesus. 

21.  One  must  not  make  a  general  principle  out  of  what 
Jesus  here  says.  The  reply  is  relative  (a)  to  the  particular 
individual,  (6)  to  the  particular  epoch.  The  man  s  morality  had 
been  somewhat  negative ;  he  had  committed  no  wrong,  but  he  had 
attained  to  no  high  standard  of  right.  He  had  injured  no  man, 
but  he  had  not  benefited  many.  His  abstentions  from  wrong- 
doing had  made  no  great  calls  upon  him.  He  had  not  shown 
much  self-sacrifice  and  self-denial.  He  was,  perhaps,  dimly  conscious 
himself  of  this  inadequacy  or  imperfection.  Not  all  was  right 
within  him,  though  he  had  done  no  wrong.  It  is  not  surely  un- 
warrantable to  suppose  that  Jesus  realized  this.  The  old  com- 
mandments, of  which  Jesus  selects  a  few  as  typical  or  as  examples, 
are  sufficient  for  salvation  if  they  are  fiilly  and  actively  earned 
out.  It  all  depends  upon  the  '  how ' ;  it  all  depends  upon  the  will 
and  the  heart.  Jesus,  therefore,  to  test  the  real  ethical  quality  of 
the  man,  bids  him  make  a  big  and  complete  sacrifice.  Let  him 
give  up  his  fortune  and  private  ties,  let  him  become  a  disciple.  If 
he  will  do  that,  there  is  no  doubt  that  his  heart  is  keen  on  goodness, 
his  will  powerful  enough  to  put  the  desires  and  ideals  of  his  heart 
into  operation.  If  he  will  do  that,  there  can  be  no  doubt,  and  he 
need  feel  none,  that  he  has  fully  kept  the  commandments,  and 
that  he  will  inherit  eternal  life.  The  above  seems  the  more 
probable  explanation  of  what  Jesus  says  here.  But  it  may  also 
be  that  in  accordance  with  what  he  has  already  laid  down,  he  is 
simply  telling  the  man  the  conditions  of  discipleship,  and  adding 
that  such  discipleship  is  the  highest  life,  sure  to  result  in,  though 
not  the  absolute  condition  of,  the  heavenly  and  eternal  life. 

Loisy  goes  a  little  further ;  he  says :  '  Although  the  programme 
marked  out  by  Jesus  is,  in  actual  fact,  a  programme  of  perfection 
which  is  not  suitable  for  all  men,  since  its  universal  application 
would  throw  all  the  arrangements  of  life  into  confusion,  it  is  not 
announced  as  an  optional  programme  and  a  work  of  supererogation ; 
it  is  imposed  upon  those  who  intend  to  follow  the  Saviour,  that  is  to 
say,  on  those  who  intend  to  take  an  active  part  in  the  coming  of 
the  Kingdom  of  heaven,  to  represent  the  gospel  in  the  eyes  of  the 
world,  to  co-operate  with  Jesus  in  the  salvation  of  their  brethren, 
and  to  assure  for  themselves  beforehand  a  place  in  the  city  of  the 
elect.  At  the  moment  when  Jesus  spoke,  whosoever  sincerely 
desired  the  reign  of  God  was  bound  to  leave  everything  in  order 
to  follow  him  who  was  bringing  it  upon  the  earth '  {E.  S.  II.  p.  214). 

But  it  is  not  a  fair  criticism  of  Jesus's  words  to  suppose  that  he 
here  lays  down  the  one  means  or  canon  of  salvation  for  everybody 


X.  17-31]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  249 

throughout  the  ages.  It  is  also  a  false  criticism  when  the  counsel 
of  Jesus  is  condemned  because  it  would  not  be  to  the  benefit  of 
existing  society  if  all  of  us  were  to  give  all  we  possessed  to  the 
poor.  The  point  here  is  not  what  would  benefit  society,  but  what 
will  be  a  difiicult  thing  for  the  individual.  And  who  can  deny 
that  for  the  average  excellent  citizen  it  would  be  a  hard  sacrifice 
to  sell  all  he  has  and  give  it  to  the  poor  ?  The  questioner  did  not 
refuse  to  comply  with  the  advice  which  Jesus  gave  him  because 
the  advice  was  '  quixotic '  or  'impracticable,'  or  'not  for  the  benefit 
of  society,'  or  '  not  even  good  for  the  poor,'  but  because  he  did  not 
want  to  give  up  his  possessions  and  make  the  sacrifice.  Jesus 
divined  where  the  shoe  would  pinch.  If  the  man  was  really  keen 
about  goodness,  let  him  make  the  one  great  sacrifice  which  would 
prove  his  keenness.  Or  was  he  merely  a  professor  ?  '  The  words 
are  not  a  general  counsel  of  perfection,  but  a  test  of  obedience  and 
faith  which  the  Lord  saw  to  be  necessary  in  this  particular  case ' 
(Swete).     This  seems  fair  exegesis. 

Then,  too,  one  must  remember  that  Jesus  believed  that  the 
end  of  the  existing  order  was  imminent.  In  the  new  order  there 
would  be  no  need  of  wealth  and  no  social  inequalities.  But,  lastly, 
we  must  also  admit  that  Jesus,  as  we  see  from  what  follows,  and 
as  we  gather  from  other  passages,  did  regard  personal  poverty  as  a 
mark  of  the  ideal.  He  had  a  bias  in  favour  of  poverty,  and  against 
riches.  At  the  same  time,  what  was  said  for  a  particular  purpose 
at  a  particular  time  to  a  particular  individual  must  not  be  turned 
into  a  universal  rule,  and  then  laid  to  the  account  or  charge  of 
him  who  said  it.  As  to  the  effects  in  history  of  Jesus's  words,  that 
is  another  matter.  The  effects  have  been  immense,  and  both  for 
good  and  for  evil. 

The  fragment  from  the  Gospel  of  the  Hebrews  is  interesting. 
How  can  a  man  be  said  to  have  fulfilled  the  commandments  of  the 
Lord  when  he  lives  in  comfort  and  wealth,  and  so  many  of  his 
brethren  are  in  distress  ?  '  And  the  Lord  said  to  him :  how  canst 
thou  say  I  have  fulfilled  the  law  and  the  prophets.  For  it  is 
written  in  the  Law,  thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself,  and 
behold  many  of  thy  brothers,  children  of  Abraham,  are  covered 
with  filth,  and  thy  house  is  full  of  good  things  and  nothing  goes 
from  it  to  them.' 

'Treasure  in  heaven.'  See  Matt.  vi.  20.  The  human  touch 
that  Jesus  felt  an  affection  for  the  man,  who  was  honest,  if  narrow, 
is  omitted  by  Matthew  and  Luke. 

The  •  one  thing  which  was  wanting '  was  the  ideal ;  an  en- 
thusiasm or  passion  for  righteousness.  The  man  possessed,  if  one 
may  say  so,  ordinary  morality ;  he  could  not  rise  to  ideal  morality. 
Jesus  would  seem  to  imply  that  God  in  his  mercy  will  not  refuse 


2SO  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  i7-3» 

•  salvation '  to  those  who,  though  without  great  or  complete  self- 
denial,  yet  obey  the  fundamental  commands  of  morality ;  but  to 
be  a,  follower  of  Jesus  demanded  complete  self-surrender.  Or  even: 
to  be  a  follower  of  Jesus  demanded  a  breaking  away  from  the 
ordinary  ties  and  interests  of  the  world. 

23-31.  The  paragraph  which  succeeds  to  the  refusal  of  the 
man  to  make  the  sacrifice  which  Jesus  asked  seems  written  from 
a  still  sterner  point  of  view.  And  we  also  see  from  it  how  the 
conception  of  the  '  Kingdom '  seems  to  vary.  The  Kingdom  in 
one  sense  is  already  being  realized  in  the  small  number  of  persons 
who  have  gathered  round  Jesus.  They  have  accepted  its  conditions, 
'received  its  yoke,'  and  made  the  sacrifice  it  demands.  But,  in 
another  sense,  the  Kingdom  is  only  to  be  realized  after  the  end  of 
the  old  order,  at  and  after  the  resurrection  of  the  dead.  It  is 
equivalent  to  the  '  world  to  come,'  or  '  life  everlasting.'  And  the 
conditions  which  secure  the  entry  to  the  Kingdom,  as  realized 
in  and  among  the  followers  of  Jesus,  are  transferred  to  the  other 
Kingdom  beyond  the  grave,  or  at  all  events  after  the  Judgment 
and  resurrection.  The  conditions  of  the  Kingdom  in  the  one 
sense  are  made  the  almost  imperative  conditions  for  the  Kingdom 
in  the  other  sense.  This  is  a  most  significant  increase  of  severity, 
but  one  can  see  how  the  varying  sense  of  the  conception  of  the 
Kingdom  could  bring  it  about. 

W.  has  a  very  important  note  dealing  with  these  differences 
about  the  conditions  of  '  eternal  life '  or  the  '  Kingdom  of  God.' 
He  says: 

'  In  spite  of  the  words  "  one  thing  thou  lackest,"  Jesus  regards 
the  fulfilment  of  the  commandments  as  adequate  for  the  acqui- 
sition of  eternal  life  (cp.  Luke  xvi.  29).  Only  for  his  disciples  and 
followers  does  he  demand  something  more,  or  rather  something 
totally  different:  a  complete  severance  from  the  world.  But  finally 
he  declares  that  this  complete  discipleship,  with  its  abandonment 
of  all  earthly  ties  and  goods,  is  the  general  and  indispensable 
condition  for  everyone  who  would  enter  into  the  Kingdom  of 
God.  That  is  a  tremendous  increase  of  demand.  The  distance 
from  the  one  stage  to  the  other  is  so  great  that  it  only  becomes 
intelligible  on  the  supposition  that  a  historic  development  lies 
between  the  two  {unter  Voraussetzung  eines  dazvdschen  liegenden 
Prozesses).' 

23-25.  An  important  question  here  arises.  In  24  Jesus  says 
generally  (according  to  the  best  MSS.),  '  how  difficult  it  is  to  enter 
the  Kingdom.'  In  the  previous  verse  he  had  said,  '  how  difficult 
It  IS  for  the  rich  to  enter  the  Kingdom.'  Are  we  to  understand 
that,  m  spite  of  the  omission  of  the  qualifying  words  'for  the  rich,' 


X.  17-3']  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  25 1 

24  means  the  same  as,  and  no  more  than,  23  ?  This  seems  to  be 
the  opinion  of  some  commentators.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  24  is 
general,  and  is,  with  Holtzmann,  to  be  compared  with  such  state- 
ments as  Matt.  vii.  13,  14,  then  there  is  much  to  be  said  for 
W.,  who,  with  the  Codex  Bezse  (D),  would  transpose  24  and  25. 
We  then  get  an  intelligible  intensification.  Jesus  first  speaks  of 
the  difficulty  of  the  rich  (in  23  and  25).  The  disciples  are 
'astonished.'  Not  satisfied  with  this,  Jesus  begins  again,  and 
makes  the  statement  general :  '  how  difficult  for  all  men  it  is  to 
enter  the  Kingdom.'  At  this  they  are  amazed  still  more,  and 
say, '  Who  then  can  be  saved  ? '  Such  a  question  would  have  far 
less  force  and  meaning  if,  as  in  the  ordinary  text,  it  immediately 
followed  the  verse  about  the  rich  and  the  camel. 
There  are  thus  two  statements  to  be  considered : 

(i)    How  hard  it  is  for  the  rich  to  enter  the  Kingdom. 

(2)     How  hard  it  is  for  anyone  to  enter. 

As  to  (i),  it  seems  a  fact  that  Jesus  had  a  bias  against  property 
and  in  favour  of  poverty.  A  similar  bias,  less  definitely  expressed, 
is  visible  in  the  Psalms.  One  has  to  criticise  the  statement  of 
Jesus  differently,  according  as  one  interprets  the  Kingdom  to 
mean :  (a)  the  life  of  '  heaven,'  '  salvation,'  and  the  like,  or  (6)  the 
highest  life  on  earth.  If  it  means  the  former,  we  should  (to  my 
mind)  justly  regard  the  saying  of  Jesus  as  harsh,  unjustifiable, 
and  presumptuous.  It  is  not  for  man  to  know  the  manner  and 
the  laws  of  the  life  beyond  the  grave.  But  to  exclude  whole 
classes,  or  indeed  permanently  to  exclude  any,  from  its  blessedness 
conflicts  with  our  conception  of  the  goodness  of  God.  The  horrible 
doctrine  that  most  men  are  '  lost '  and  that  few  are  '  saved '  seems 
to  have  been  held  by  Jesus  as  well  as  by  the  author  of  the  fourth 
book  of  Ezra.  The  latter  had  natural  qualms  against  the  odious 
doctrine,  which  do  him  the  highest  honour.  It  remains  a  mournful 
religious  puzzle  that  Jesus,  if  such  verses  as  Matt.  vii.  13  were 
said  by  him,  with  all  his  pity  and  love  for  the  sinner  and  the 
outcast,  had  no  such  qualms. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  the  Kingdom  merely  means  the  highest 
life  on  earth,  then  there  is  a  good  deal  to  be  said  for  Jesus's 
statement.  It  is  a  difficult  thing  for  a  rich  man  to  lead  the 
highest  life.  But  there  is  little  reason  to  suppose  that  Jesus 
meant  this.  For  the  Rabbinic  view  on  riches,  see  Additional 
Note  20. 

The  second  and  wider  statement,  '  how  hard  it  is  for  anybody 
to  enter  the  Kingdom,'  cannot  be  discussed  here.  It  would  take 
too  long.  One  must,  at  any  rate,  distinguish.  It  is  hard  for  anyone 
to  live  the  highest  life.     Goodness  is  not  easy.     But  we  may  also 


252  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  17-31 

say  that  by  his  own  actions  it  is  hard  for  anyone  to  '  merit '  the 
blessedness  of  eternal  life.  For  'merit  lives  from  man  to  man,' 
and  not  from  man  to  God.  The  eternal  life  must  be  a  grace 
granted,  not  a  guerdon  won.  Yet  the  hope  is  universal,  and  any 
dogma  which  would  permanently  exclude  many,  or  even  any,  from 
a  blessedness  to  be  allotted  to  some  is  both  repugnant  in  itself  as 
well  as  flagrantly  inconsistent  with  the  goodness  of  God. 

Merx,  mainly  following  the  reading  of  the  S.S.  (which  reads 
both  in  22  and  in  24  '  who  trust  in  their  riches,'  and  thus  agrees 
with  the  old  '  Textus  Receptus,'  followed  by  A.V.  and  here  by  R.V 
also),  thinks  that  Jesus  was  not  speaking  about  the  general  difficulty 
of  entering  the  Kingdom  at  all.  Nor  even  was  he  speaking  of 
wealth  without  qualifications.  Only  those  who  trust  in  their  wealth 
have  these  difficulties.  The  text  was  more  than  once  altered  in 
an  ascetic  direction.  On  the  other  hand,  many  commentators 
think  that  the  reading  of  the  S.S.  and  the  '  Textus  Receptus '  was 
a  deliberate  attenuation  of  the  old  drastic  assertions.  Perhaps 
23  and  25  are  what  is  really  primitive ;  24,  says  Loisy, '  appartient 
sans  doute  a  une  redaction  secondaire,  mais  les  w.  26,  27  semblent 
appartenir  k  la  meme  couche  que  24'  (E.  S.  11.  p.  216,  n.  4).  Loisy 
thinks  that  Mark  has  combined  a  reflection  as  to  the  general 
difficulty  of  salvation  with  a  reflection  on  the  special  difficulty  of 
salvation  for  the  rich.  The  remark  in  27  applies  to  the  general 
reflection.  The  grace  of  God  will  help  the  inadequate  powers  of 
man,  and  some  will  be  'chosen'  for  salvation.  Loisy  suspects 
behind  27,  'the  doctrine  of  Paul  on  divine  "election"  and  on  the 
power  of  grace'  (E.  S.  II.  p.  217). 

27.  Jesus  qualifies  his  own  statement.  It  is  hard,  but  not 
impossible.  By  his  own  effort  the  rich  man,  or  any  man,  can 
'  hardly '  enter ;  by  God's  grace  he  may.  Here  we  have  the  same 
antinomy  as  is  alluded  to  by  Shakespeare ;  the  highest  exertion  is 
demanded,  but  the  result  is  due  to  the  grace  of  God.  At  least  to 
some  extent,  Jesus  here  gives  back  what  he  had  before  taken 
away.  In  our  modern  Jewish  faith  we  go  yet  further.  By  God's 
grace  we  hold  that  all  human  souls  shall  ultimately  enter  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven.     We  are  convinced  'Universalists.' 

28-31.  Peter's  remark  and  Jesus's  reply  seem  joined  to  what 
has  preceded  by  an  '  artifice  r^dactionnel '  (E.  8.  i.  p.  94). 

28.  Peter's  interjection  means  that  he  and  his  fellow-apostles, 
who  have  divested  themselves  of  everything  for  the  sake  of  Jesus 
a,nd  his  cause,  must  and  ought  therefore  surely  to  inherit  the 
life  eternal. 


X.  17-31]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  253 

29.  To  this  Jesus  replies  that  they  will.  All  who  have  made 
the  sacrifice  of  family  ties  and  of  personal  property  for  the  sake  of 
the  gospel  will  receive  their  reward. 

The  meaning  of  29  and  30  is  brought  out  a  little  more  clearly 
if,  with  W.,  a  colon  is  put  after  eKarovTaifkaaiova.  He  and  others 
also  suppose  that  the  original  saying  ended  with  this  word.  The 
'hundredfold'  reward  is  simply  eternal  life,  understood  not  ex- 
pressed. Afterwards  the  '  hundredfold '  was  interpreted.  We  are 
now  told  that  the  reward  is  twofold :  the  main  reward  is  the  life 
eternal,  but  even  in  this  world  the  faithful  disciples  will  receive, 
in  lieu  of  the  property  or  family  they  give  up,  their  place  and 
their  share  in  the  Christian  community,  although  this  collective 
property  and  family  can  only  be  shared  in  amid  persecutions. 
(fip.  Acts  ii.  44,  'AH  that  believed  were  together,  and  had  all 
things  common;  and  they  sold  their  possessions  and  goods,  and 
parted  them  to  all,  as  any  man  had  need.'  So,  too,  iv.  32,  Romans 
xvi.  13,  'Salute  Rufus...and  his  mother  and  mine';  and  cp. 
I  Cor.  iii.  22,  iv.  15 ;  2  Cor.  vi.  8-10.) 

Notice  the  omission  of  the  '  wife.'  Is  it  implied  that  one  may 
and  must  at  the  gospel's  call  abandon  brother,  sister,  mother, 
child,  but  one's  wife  one  must  not  abandon  ?  See  Burkitt's  Early 
Eastern  Christianity,  p.  119. 

Loisy  gives  another  explanation :  *  It  would  have  been  awkward 
to  mention  the  wife  in  the  second  clause  along  with  the  brothers, 
sisters,  and  children,  who  were  to  be  restored  an  hundredfold ; 
perhaps  too  the  Evangelist  considered  that  the  married  apostles 
had  not  really  left  their  wives,  and  that,  if  they  had,  this  sacrifice 
would  have  been  without  direct  compensation  in  this  world.  In 
the  spiritual  sense  in  which  Jesus  means  it,  there  can  be  no 
allusion  except  to  brothers,  sisters,  mothers,  children.  Fathers 
might  also  have  been  mentioned,  but  perhaps  Mark  refrained  from 
including  them  in  the  second  enumeration,  because  the  Christian 
language  of  his  time  did  not  admit  the  use  of  this  word  in  the 
plural'  {E.  S.  11.  p.  219). 

The  verse  is  an  interesting  confirmation  of  Acts  ii.  44,  but  was 
surely  said  and  written  in  the  first  period  of  persecution  of  the 
infant  Church,  many  years  after  the  death  of  the  founder.  But 
note  that  the  words  'with  persecutions'  are  wanting  in  the  parallel 
passage  in  Luke  and  Matthew.  '  They  seem  to  betray  the  later 
hand  of  one  who  had,  indeed,  found  anew  in  the  hearts  and  homes 
of  believers  the  dear  relationships  which  he  had  himself  surrendered, 
but  who  knew  likewise  at  what  price  of  danger  and  suffering  they 
must  be  won '  (Carpenter,  First  Three  Gospels,  p.  210). 

J.  Weiss  also  thinks  that  the  passage  is  not  authentic.  For 
Jesus  supposed  that  the  end  of  the  old  order  was  at  hand.     There 


254  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  17-31 

was  therefore  hardly  time  for  any  earthly  reward  of  those  who  had 
made  renunciation.  0.  Holtzmann,  on  the  other  hand,  thinks  that 
we  have  here  the  conception  of  a  Messianic  Kingdom  before  the 
eternal  and  future  world  (a  distinction  known  also  to  the  Rabbis 
and  prominent  in  4  Ezra) :  '  am  Ende  dieser  Welt  irdische  Giiter, 
in  der  kiinftigen  Welt  das  ewige  Leben '  (NeutestamentUche  Zeit- 
geschichte,  p.  393). 

B.  Weiss  argues  with  some  force  that  the  original  of  Mark  x.  29 
is  Matt.  xix.  29,  which,  of  course,  he  assigns  to  Q.  See  Quellen,  A, 
p.  123,  B,  p.  68.  Loisy  rejects  this  view,  holding  that  only  Matt. 
xix.  28  is  primitive.     See  below. 

31.  Many  persons  who  are  now  rich  and  prominent  shall  in 
the  life  to  come  be  last — i.e.  excluded ;  while  many  who  are  now 
poor,  and  in  the  world's  view  last,  shall  be  among  the  first  and 
the  most  prominent  in  the  life  to  come.  The  disciples  who  have 
'  lost '  all  on  earth  shall  be  foremost  in  the  Kingdom  of  God.  Cp. 
for  other  uses  of  the  saying  Matt.  xx.  16;  Luke  xiiL  30.  From 
another  point  of  view  there  is  to  be  no  pre-eminence  of  station  or 
merit  in  the  '  Kingdom.'  '  Whosoever  would  be  first  among  you 
shall  be  servant  of  alL'     See  below,  verse  44. 

Mr  Allen  thinks  that  'it  seems  best  (with  Swete)  to  under- 
stand the  words  as  a  rebuke  to  the  self-complacent  spirit  implied 
in  Peter's  words :  It  may  be  difficult  for  the  rich  to  enter  into  the 
Kingdom,  but  we  who  have  left  all  are  in  no  danger  of  exclusion. 
Christ's  words  are  a  warrant  for  this  confidence,  and  at  the  same 
time  a  rebuke  and  a  warning.  The  ambiguity  lies  in  the  "  first" 
and  "  last."  Does  He  mean,  Many  who  first  became  my  disciples 
will  find  greater  difficulty  of  entry  than  many  who  followed  me  at 
a  later  period  ?  Or  is  "  first "  used  of  rank  rather  than  of  time : 
Many  who  now  seem  to  hold  a  position  of  privilege  will  then  find 
themselves  in  the  lowest  place  ? '  M.  Loisy  has  special  and  in- 
teresting views  on  this  section.  The  adage  in  3 1  is  very  authentic: 
to  Jesus  it  seems  to  have  meant  that  tax-collectors  and  sinners 
will  enter  the  Kingdom,  and  that  self-righteous  Pharisees  will  be 
excluded.  But  to  Mark  it  means  a  hit  at  Peter  and  the  anti- 
paulinists.  It  is  not  only  the  Twelve  who  will  have  a  high  place 
in  the  Kingdom,  but  all  who  have  'renounced'  for  its  sake,  as  Paul 
had  done.  The  Twelve  who  think  themselves  first  will  have  to 
yield  place  to  those  who  come  later.  '  Paul  et  ses  pareils  devien- 
dront  premiers,  et  dans  I'^lfiglise  et  dans  le  royaume  dternel'  (E.  S.  n. 
p.  221).  Loisy  regards  30  as  certainly  secondary.  A  double  felicity, 
a  reward  in  this  world,  and  not  only  in  the  world  to  come,  is  not  the 
oldest  point  of  view.  The  Christian  fraternity  was  not  the  recom- 
pense Jesus  had  in  view,  but  Paul  found  a  reward  in  it,  though  it 


X.  32-34]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAKK  255 

came  with  persecutions.  [This  view  assumes  that  one  cannot  break 
up  30  and  interpret  '  hundredfold,'  as  W.  does.]  What  Matthew 
has  in  xix.  28  is  certainly  authentic.  Matthew  preserved  it  and 
combined  it  with  what  he  found  in  Mark.  Mark  omitted  it  on 
purpose.  The  primitive  story  probably  contained  only  this :  Peter's 
question  in  Matt.  xix.  27  (Mark  x.  28)  and  the  reply  in  Matt. 
xix.  28. 


32-34.    Thied  Prediction  of  Suffeeing  and  Death 
(Gp.  Matt.  XX.  17-19;  Luke  xviiL  31-34) 

32  And  they  were  on  the  way  going  up  to  Jerusalem ;  and  Jesus 
went  on  in  front  of  them ;  and  they  were  amazed ;  and  they  that 
followed  were  afraid.     And  again  he  took  the  Twelve  aside,  and 

33  began  to  tell  them  what  would  happen  unto  him.  '  Behold,  we  go 
up  to  Jerusalem ;  and  the  Son  of  man  will  be  given  up  unto  the 
chief  priests  and  unto  the  scribes ;  and  they  will  condemn  him  to 

34  death,  and  will  give  him  up  to  the  heathen.  And  they  will  mock 
him,  and  spit  upon  him,  and  scourge  him,  and  kill  him  :  and  after 
three  days  he  will  rise  again.' 

32.  Here,  for  the  first  time,  Jerusalem  is  distinctly  stated  to 
be  the  goal  of  the  journey  and  the  scene  of  the  final  catastrophe. 
One  must  assume  that,  in  addition  to  the  Twelve,  there  were 
others  who  also  accompanied  Jesus  upon  his  fateful  path.  Cp. 
X.  I.  The  S.S.  omits  iraXiv,  which  alludes  to  ix.  31.  Is  Merx 
right  in  saying  'Der  Text  ist  eine  Doppelung,  die  durch  •n-dXiv 
markiert  ist '  ? 

34.  It  is  strange  that  each  prediction  is,  as  it  were,  in- 
dependent of  the  other.  Jesus  here  tells  what  is  going  to  happen 
to  him  as  if  he  had  never  mentioned  the  subject  before.  That 
the  prediction  in  its  present  detailed  form  is  a  vaticinium  post 
evmtum  needs  no  proving.  Yet  Jesus  may  have  had  some 
dark  ominous  feeling  that  he  was  destined  to  suffer  and  die  in 
Jerusalem.  That  he  had  more  is  not  very  probable.  For  though 
the  cry  on  the  cross  can  be  explained  away,  it  is  perhaps  rather 
more  likely  that  the  great  denouement,  which,  in  the  Gospel  story, 
Jesus  is  represented  as  expecting  to  happen  soon  after  his  death, 
at  his  Parousia,  he  really  expected  to  happen  after  his  arrival  at 
Jerusalem,  and  without  the  necessity  of  his  death.  The  con- 
ception of  his  death  as  a  ransom  was  not  his  own.     In  his  mind 


2S6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  32-34 

it  was  surely  through  his  life  and  his  teaching  that  he  hoped  to 
benefit  his  people,  not  through  bis  death.  For  another  view  cp. 
the  note  on  45.  M.  Loisy  thinks  that  these  predictions  in  Mark 
are  founded  upon  a  narrative  in  which  the  eventuality  of  death 
was  merely  indicated,  and  when  the  hope  of  a  near  triumph  was 
prominent  (restait  au  premier  plan).  Jesus  went  to  Jerusalem, 
led  by  a  great  hope,  but  without  dissimulating  to  himself  the 
possible  danger.  The  disciples  saw  chiefly  the  danger;  Jesus 
encourages  them  with  hope.  This  was  the  real  historical  situation, 
which  32  still  laintly  shows  (E.  S.  u.  pp.  223,  233). 

35-45.    The  Sons  of  Zebedee 
(Cp.  Matt.  XX.  20-28 ;  Luke  xxii.  24-27) 

35  And  James  and  John,  the  sons  of  Zebedee,  came  unto  him, 
saying, '  Master,  we  wish  that  thou  wouldst  do  for  us  whatever  we 

36  ask  thee.'     And  he  said  unto  them,  '  What  do  ye  wish  that  I 

37  should  do  for  you  ? '  They  said  unto  him, '  Grant  unto  us  that  we 
may  sit,  one  on  thy  right  hand,  and  the  other  on  thy  left  hand,  in 

38  thy  glory.'  But  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  Ye  know  not  what  ye  ask: 
can  ye  drink  of  the  cup  that  I  am  to  drink  of?  and  be  baptized 

39  with  the  baptism  that  I  am  to  be  baptized  with  ? '  And  they  said 
unto  him, '  We  can.'  And  Jesus  said  unto  them, '  Ye  shall  indeed 
drink  of  the  cup  that  I  am  to  drink  of:  and  with  the  baptism 

40  that  I  am  to  be  baptized  with  shall  ye  be  baptized :  but  to  sit  on 
my  right  hand  and  on  my  left  hand  is  not  mine  to  give ;  but  it 
shall  be  for  them  for  whom  it  is  destined.' 

41  And  when  the  ten  heard  it,  they  began  to  be  indignant  with 

42  James  and  John.  But  Jesus  called  them  to  him,  and  said  unto 
them,  'Ye  know  that  they  who  are  supposed  to  rule  over  the 
nations  lord  it  over  them ;  and  their  great  ones  play  the  tyrant 

43  over  them.     But  it  is  not  so  among  you :  but  whoever  wisheth  to 

44  become  great  among  you,  let  him  be  your  servant ;  and  whoever 

45  of  you  would  be  the  first,  let  him  be  the  slave  of  all.  For  the 
Son  of  man  came  not  to  be  served,  but  to  serve,  and  to  give  his 
life  as  a  ransom  for  many.' 

'  Gomme  la  seconde  annonce  de  la  passion,  la  troisifeme  est 
suivie  d'une  querelle  entre  les  disciples,  touchant  les  premieres 
places  du  royaume  des  cieux.     L'analogie  des  situations  pourrait 


X.  35-45]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  257 

expliquer  celle  des  incidents  qui  se  produisent ;  mais  I'emploi  des 
mimes  ^l^ments  traditionnels  doit  faire  admettre  comme  seule 
vraisemblable  I'idde  de  combinaisons  parallfeles,  sur  un  fond  commun 
de  matdriaux  diversement  arranges'  (E.  S.  11.  p.  235).  Again  the 
question  of  grades  and  ranks  in  the  future  Kingdom  is  raised,  but 
from  a  rather  different  point  of  view.  The  section  gives  the 
impression  of  a  mixture  of  history  and  legend,  of  early  and  late, 
which  can  never  be  unravelled.  It  rests  probably  on  some  vague 
recollections  of  a  conversation  between  Jesus  and  the  two  apostles, 
but  what  actually  took  place  cannot  now  be  ascertained.  M.  Loisy 
doubts  the  historicity  of  the  incident.  It  seems  to  rest,  he  thinks, 
upon  Jesus's  predictions  about  the  thrones  which  Matthew  preserved 
and  Mark  omitted  (Matt.  xix.  28).  The  language  is  not  so  simple 
as  the  usual  language  of  Jesus ;  it  is  also  especially  noteworthy 
that  the  disciples,  who  fail  to  understand  what  Jesus  means  in  his 
direct  predictions  {e.g.  ix.  32),  here  understand  perfectly  (verse  39) 
the  two  metaphors.  'It  is  very  significant  that  in  Mark  Jesus 
refuses  two  thrones  to  the  sons  of  Zebedee  just  after  he  has, 
according  to  Matthew,  promised  thrones  to  the  Twelve.  May  we 
not,  therefore,  conjecture  that  the  demand  of  the  sons  of  Zebedee 
and  the  refusal  of  Jesus  replaces  the  promise  of  the  twelve  thrones, 
in  order  that  none  may  make  use  of  that  promise  against  Paul  and 
his  missionary  colleagues?'  (E.  S.  i.  p.  96).  '  Has  not  one  the  right 
to  conjecture  that  the  evangelist  is  continuing  his  polemic  against 
the  "judaizers,"  and  that  it  is  these  who  are  aimed  at  in  the 
lessons  which  Peter,  James  and  John  receive  ? '  (E.  S.  Ii.  p.  223). 

37.  It  is  not  said  that  the  '  glory '  referred  to  is  the  '  glory  ' 
of  the  Parousia  after  the  death  and  resurrection.  But  we  must 
suppose  that  this  is  assumed. 

38.  Jesus  can  only  promise  them  a  death  of  suffering  like  his 
own.  The  places  of  honour  in  the  world  to  come  are  not  his  to 
give.    Is  it  implied : 

(a)  That  the  highest  distinction  which  his  true  disciples 
should  aim  at  or  desire  is  to  suffer  like  their  master — a  pre- 
eminence in  suffering,  not  in  glory  ? 


or, 


(6)    That    only    through    such   suffering    can  any  pre- 
eminence in  the  future  world  be  obtained? 
Perhaps  both  thoughts  were  in  the  mind  of  the  writer. 

The  cup  is  used  in  the  Old  Testament  as  a  metaphor  for 
affliction;  cp.  Isaiah  li.  17;  Jer.  xlix.  12,  &c.  The  waters  of  aflaiction 
are  also  familiar,  especially  in  the  Psalms. 

The  question  means:  Can  you  face  the  pain  and  the  death 

M.  17 


2S8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  35-45 

such  as  I  am  about  to  undergo  ?  Can  you  face  martyrdom  ?  The 
baptism  is  of  blood.  It  is  a  baptism  of  death,  which  will  usher 
in  the  everlasting  glory.  '  Can  they  stand  at  his  side  in  all  those 
afflictions  which  are  coming  upon  him  ?  That  is  the  fellowship  he 
has  to  offer  them.  This  pathetic  question  shows  more  accurately 
than  the  set  predictions  the  anticipations  Jesus  now  had  in  his 
mind.  The  questions  are  only  intelligible  if  he  did  not  clearly 
realize  the  details  of  his  impending  sufferings.'  So  Menzies.  It 
is  an  important  note,  as  giving  a  fair  argument  for  the  theory 
that  Jesus  did  foresee  a  calamitous  end  at  Jerusalem,  though 
the  words  in  which  he  spoke  about  it  have  been  frequently 
modified  and  made  definite  to  suit  the  actual  result. 

39.  In  this  passage  martyrdom  seems  predicted  for  both 
James  and  John.  If  only  James  had  been  martjnred  (Acts  xil  2), 
the  prediction  that  both  would  die  the  martyr's  death  would 
perhaps  not  have  found  a  place  in  the  gospel.  Hence  this  passage 
suggests  doubts  as  to  the  trustworthiness  of  the  tradition  that 
John  died  peacefully  at  a  very  advanced  age, 

J.  Weiss  also  supposes  that  both  John  and  James  were 
dead  when  this  passage  of  Mark  was  written,  and  their  death  by 
martyrdom  has  influenced  its  form.  They  asked  for  a  high  honour, 
and  this,  in  a  sense,  has  been  granted  them  in  a  way  other  than 
they  meant.  Through  death  they  have  reached  their  Master's 
heavenly  throne.  They  ask  for  what  they  did  not  understand. 
For  unconsciously  they  ask  for  their  own  death.  On  the  other 
hand,  Hamack  thinks  that  in  this  verse  we  have  a  prediction  of 
Jesus  which  was  only  half  fulfilled.     Hence  Luke  suppressed  it. 

41-45.  Authentic  words  of  Jesus  seem  expanded  and  put  by 
the  Evangeli.st  into  an  artificial  connection  with  the  preceding  story 
(so  Loisy,  E.  S.  11.  p.  239).  In  that  case  we  need  not  be  surprised 
that  the  reply  which  Jesus  makes  to  the  ten  does  not  seem  in 
keeping  with  what  he  had  to  reply  to.  The  ten  are  irritated 
that  James  and  John  had  asked  for  a  special  place  in  the  perfected 
Kingdom.  What  Jesus  says  is  that  within  the  community  there 
must  be  no  question  of  ruler  and  servant.  Within  the  community 
the  only  pre-eminence  to  be  sought  for  and  acknowledged  must  he 
a  pre-eminence  in  service.  He  who  serves  best  is  by  that  very 
fact  the  greatest.  The  question  of  what  is  to  happen  after  death 
or  at  the  Parousia  is  neglected. 


■-&* 


42.  A  careful  comparison  of  42-45  with  Luke  xxii.  25-27 
certainly  leads  to  the  very  strong  probability  that  Luke's  version 
is  more  primitive  than  Mark's.  This  is  one  of  B.  Weiss's  very  best 
instances.     See  Quellen,  A,  pp.  141,  142.     There  really  does  seem 


X.  35-45]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  259 

good  reason  to  think  that  Luke  has  here  preserved  the  text  of  Q 
which  Mark  used  as  well  as  he,  but  altered  more.  In  each  verse 
and  statement  Luke's  language  is  more  simple  and  more  '  concrete ' 
than  Mark's,  and  in  Luke  nothing  is  said  of  the  redemptive  or 
vicarious  death,  and  the  term  Son  of  man  is  not  employed.  The 
'rule'  of  the  best  Christian  disciples  in  the  Kingdom  must  be 
quite  diiferent  from  the  external,  ordinary,  tyrannical  rule  of 
Gentile  rulers  over  their  kingdoms.  They  rule  for  their  own 
advantage,  but  their  rule  is  no  true  or  genuine  rule.  Outward  rule 
and  outward  subjection  are  the  marks  of  the  Gentile,  ol  So/coOvTes 
apx^tv  Twv  eOvcSv,  '  they  who  are  supposed  to  rule ' ;  for  these 
words  mean  that  the  Gentile  rulers  are,  as  Plato  would  say,  not 
true  rulers.  But  they  may  merely  mean : '  they  who  are  accounted 
or  known  to  be  rulers.' 

43.  Gp.  ix.  35.  SiaKovoii  is  a  servant  who  waits  at  table.  In 
the  Messianic  banquet  the  greatest  is  he  who  is  the  lowliest. 
Greatness  among  the  citizens  of  the  Kingdom — among  the 
members  of  the  Christian  community — is  only  to  be  won  by 
service  and  humility.  Hence  among  them  there  must  be  no 
dispute  about  primacy  or  ranks.  The  present  '  is '  seems  to  in- 
clude the  future.  And  the  future  (earai)  '  shall  be '  seems  used 
for  the  imperative.  '  Among  you  '  refers  not  to  the  Kingdom,  but 
to  the  Christian  brotherhood. 

Pre-eminence  in  service,  greatness  in  humility — these  were 
noble  conceptions  which  Jesus  introduced  to  the  world.  And 
though  humility  and  charity  were  well-known  ideals  among  the 
Rabbis,  the  particular  form  and  combination  in  which  we  find 
them  here  are,  I  think,  as  highly  original  as  they  certainly  were 
highly  stimulating  and  productive. 

The  true  meaning  of  the  verse  is,  indeed,  as  J.  Weiss  rightly 
says,  that  the  disciples  of  Jesus  are  not  to  seek  after  rule,  but  to 
find  their  life's  purpose  in  service.  Yet  Weiss  is  wrong  when  he 
says  that  the  teaching  runs  counter  to  a  fundamental  conception  of 
Judaism.  For  Jesus  is  not  here  speaking  of  national  rule.  It  is 
quite  true  that  the  Jews  did  yearn  for  rule  over  the  heathen. 
They  did  desire  that  the  tables  should  be  turned.  But  that  is 
not  the  rule  which  is  here  opposed  by  Jesus.  He  does  not  allude 
to  it  one  way  or  the  other.  A  man  might  be  keen  that  his  op- 
pressed nation  should  rule  over  its  oppressors,  and  yet  in  his  private 
life  exhibit  the  most  devoted  service.  But  this  is  not  to  detract 
fi'om  the  originality  of  Jesus.  That  he  could  regard  his  life — at 
any  rate  his  earthly  life — as  a  service,  that  he  could  see  in  this 
service  his  mission  and  his  Messiahship,  was  indeed  a  triumph  of 
moral  grandeur  and  of  religious  inspiration. 

17 — 2 


26o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  35-45 

45.     The  Lord  of  the  Kingdom  came  to  serve.     Therefore  his 
life  can  be  the  pattern  for  all. 

The  conception  of  the  Xvrpov,  '  the  ransom,'  is  quite  different. 
Only  here  do  we  find  it  placed  in  Jesus's  mouth.  We  may  see  in 
it  the  influence  of  Pauline  ideas  and  terminology.  Cp.  Romans 
XV.  3 ;  Gal.  i.  4,  ii.  20.  So  Loisy,  most  strongly :  '  The  idea  of 
the  life  given  as  a  ransom  belongs  to  another  current  of  thought 
than  the  idea  of  service'  (E.  S.  il.  p.  241).  The  commentators 
compare  i  Tim.  ii.  6,  which  may,  however,  be  based  upon  Mark. 
Jesus  gives  his  own  life  for  the  sake  of  many  lives,  avrl  does  not 
here  mean  '  in  the  place  of,' '  in  the  stead  of,'  but '  for  the  sake  of 
But  the  idea  that  his  life  is  a  substitute  for  that  of  others  is  closely 
approached.  I  do  not  see  that  the  word  'many'  constitutes  a 
difficulty.  Not  all,  but  only  some,  can  profit  by  his  death.  Those 
who  accept  and  believe  in  him  receive  the  benefit  of  his  death, 
and  join  him  in  '  eternal  life.'  In  Luke  xxii.  27  the  ransom  idea 
is  wanting.  W.  admits :  '  The  step  from  service  to  the  sacrifice  of 
life  as  a  ransom  is  a  /lera/Saert?  et?  aXXo  yevo<i.  Light  is  thrown 
upon  it  by  the  ceremonial  of  the  last  supper,  when  Jesus  adminis- 
ters his  flesh  and  blood  in  the  bread  and  wine.'  The  passage  in 
any  case  seems  to  show  the  influence  of  Isaiah  liii.  J.  Weiss  says : 
'It  is  indeed  far  from  inconceivable  that  Jesus  had  included 
the  idea  of  his  approaching  death  in  his  work  of  service  and 
love.  Nay,  it  is  even  probable  that  he  was  convinced  that  his 
death  would  in  some  way  be  beneficial  to  the  men  whom  he  had 
striven  to  win  by  deed  and  word.  But  whether  he  thought 
exactly  of  a  sacrificial  death  or  of  vicarious  penal  sufferings,  such 
as — according  to  the  later  interpretation — the  fifty-third  chapter 
of  Isaiah  is  supposed  to  have  described,  must  remain  doubtful. 
For  us  to-day,  to  whom  the  notion  of  an  offering  for  sin  offers 
many  difficulties,  it  is  pleasant  that  we  may  be  satisfied  with  the 
thought  that  his  death  was  just  the  same  as  his  whole  life:  a 
faithful  service  to  the  brethren.' 

Though  the  whole  passage  in  its  present  form  is  later  than 
Jesus,  the  ethical  conception  of  greatness  realized  in  lowly  service 
may  surely  and  safely  be  ascribed  to  him.  Moreover,  Jesus  may 
just  conceivably  have  realized  that  his  death  would  be  to  the 
advantage  of  many ;  that  many  would  enter  the  Kingdom  as  an 
effect  of  his  death.  Menzies  takes  this  view,  naturally  trying  to 
keep  as  many  words  for  Jesus  of  those  ascribed  to  him  as  he 
possibly  can.  He  thinks  '  Jesus  became  reconciled  to  the  prospect 
of  death  when  he  saw  that  he  was  to  die  for  the  benefit  of  others.' 
This  is  a  possible  view,  though  I  think  it  an  unlikely  one.  It 
is  rebutted  by  Pfleiderer,  Urchristentum,  i.  p.  372.  Holtzmann 
thinks  that  XvTpov  here  is  a  translation  of  an  Aramaic  word 


X.  46-52]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  261 

which  may  merely  mean  '  deliverance.'     Jesus  '  delivered '  people 
by  causing  them  to  repent. 

46-52.      BAETIMiEUS 

(Gp.  Matt.  ix.  27-31,  XX.  29-34;    Luke  xviii.  35-43) 

46  And  they  came  to  Jericho:  and  as  he  went  out  of  Jericho 
with  his  disciples  and  a  large  crowd,  a  blind  beggar,  Bartimseus, 

47  the  son  of  Timseus,  sat  by  the  way  side.  And  when  he  heard 
that  it  was  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  he  began  to  cry  out,  and  say, 

48  '  Jesus,  son  of  David,  pity  me.'  And  many  rebuked  him  that  he 
should  hold  his  peace :  but  he  kept  on  crying  all  the  louder,  '  Son 

49  of  David,  pity  me.'  And  Jesus  stood  still,  and  said :  '  Call  him.' 
And  they  called  the  blind  man,  saying  unto  him,  'Be  of  good 

50  cheer,  rise ;  he  calls  thee.'     And  he,  casting  away  his  cloak,  sprang 

51  up  and  came  to  Jesus.  And  Jesus  answered  and  said  unto  him, 
'What  wouldst  thou  that  I  should  do  unto  thee?'  The  blind 
man  said  unto  him,  'Master,  I  would  that  I  might  see  again.' 

52  And  Jesus  said  unto  him,  'Go  thy  way;  thy  faith  has  healed 
thee.'  And  immediately  he  received  his  sight  again,  and  followed 
Jesus  on  the  way. 

ISie  section  viii.  27-x.  ends  with  a  healing  of  a  blind  man  just 
,  as  the  section  vi.  14- viii.  26  ends  with  the  healing  of  a  blind  man. 
'In  the  present  arrangement  of  the  narratives,  the  blind  man  at 
Jericho  is  a  pendant  to  the  blind  man  at  Bethsaida  and  his  cure, 
symbolically  interpreted,  paves  the  way  for  the  Messianic  mani- 
festation which  is  to  be  enacted  on  the  Mount  of  Olives,  just 
as  the  cure  of  the  blind  man  of  Bethsaida  paves  the  way  for 
the  confession  of  Peter;  nevertheless  the  subject-matter  of  the 
miracle  {la  donnee  fondamentale  du  miracle)  seems  anterior  to  its 
interpretation.  But  it  is  permissible  to  ask  whether  the  blind 
man,  who  in  Luke  is  still  anonymous,  was  not  so  also  in  Mark's 
source.  The  same  doubt  exists  for  Jairus,  who  is  anonymous  in 
Matthew '  {E.  S.  I.  p.  96). 

47.  Jesus  does  not  here  make  any  open  objection  to  being 
called  the  son  of  David.  In  Mark  he  has  not  been  so  called  before. 
Undoubtedly,  '  son  of  David '  is,  to  Mark,  a  mere  paraphrase  for 
'Messianic  King.'  But  one  must  not  make  too  much  of  an  epithet. 
How  can  we  be  sure,  if  the  Bartimseus  episode  happened  at  all 
(aud  be  it  remembered  its  essence  is  a  miracle,  which  '  suggestion ' 


262  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  46-52 

can  hardly  account  for),  that  Bartimseus  used  the  appellation  'son 
of  David'?  Loisy  hesitates.  He  says  that  the  reserve  which 
Jesus  had  imposed  upon  his  disciples  must  now  have  ceased.  The 
blind  man  must  have  heard  that  Jesus  was  supposed  to  be  the 
Messiah.  On  the  other  hand  it  has  to  be  admitted  that  the 
Messianic  acclamation  is  no  better  prepared  for  here  than  the 
declaration  of  the  demons  in  Galilee.  In  51  Bartimaeus  calls 
Jesus  only  'Master'  {E.  S.  11.  pp.  250-252). 

48.  Why  did  '  they '  censure  him  ?  Is  the  case  parallel  with 
X.  13  ?  Then  we  must  assume  that  it  was  in  order  not  to  trouble 
Jesus  on  his  journey,  or  that  their  march  might  not  be  interrupted. 
Weiss  takes  other  ground.  He  says  '  they '  bid  him  be  silent  in 
order  that  their  secret  may  not  prematurely  be  revealed,  for  only 
at  the  entry  into  Jerusalem  do  they  purpose  to  proclaim  him  the 
Son  of  David,  or  Messiah.  This  explanation  seems  less  likely. 
Bartimseus  is  no  real  separate  name ;  it  means  merely  '  Son  of 
Timseus.' 

52.  Jesus,  in  contrast  with  viii.  22-26,  heals  by  his  mere 
word.     The  story  is  told  with  rare  simplicity  and  grace. 

In  his  remarkable  Introduction  to  the  first  three  Gospels  (only 
lis  pages  in  length,  and  yet  crowded  with  fresh  and  original 
matter)  W.  gives  a  more  connected  statement  of  his  views  con- 
cerning the  Messiahship  and  '  Messianic  consciousness '  of  Jesus. 
Brilliant  and  suggestive  as  his  views  are,  it  can  hardly  be  said 
that  they  are  without  difficulty. 

He  admits  that  Jesus  was  crucified  as  the  Messiah.  Tet  Jesus 
never  openly  proclaimed  his  Messiahship.  On  the  other  hand, 
W.  strongly  maintains  the  authenticity  of  Mark  xii.  35-37,  and  in 
this  passage  he  allows  that  Jesus  takes  pains  to  refute  an  arg;u- 
ment  against  the  hypothesis  that  he  is  the  Messiah.  To  all 
appearances  he  had  no  objection  to  others  seeing  in  himself  the 
desired  hero  in  whom  the  hopes  of  Israel  should  be  fulfilled.  And 
W.  admits,  further,  that  the  political  Messiah  was  what '  all  the 
world'  understood  by  the  word. 

Nevertheless  W.  still  strongly  holds  to  the  view  that  Jesus 
had  no  political  aspirations.  He  had  no  intention  to  raise  up  the 
fallen  throne  of  David.  He  did  not  feel  the  yoke  of  the  heathen, 
but  the  yoke  of  an  enslaving  tradition ;  he  did  not  attack  the 
Romans,  but  the  chief  priests  and  the  Scribes,  and  these  caused 
his  ruin.  He  wanted  to  create  a  religious  rebirth  of  his  people, 
though  not  merely  by  winning  individuals — for  in  that  case  he 
need  not  have  gone  to  Jerusalem.  'Als  Regenerator  konnte  er 
wol  den  Namen  des  jiidischen  Restitutor  in  integrum  acceptiren, 


X.  46-52]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  263 

obgleich  er  das  Politische  davon  abstreifte.  Es  ist  zwar  eine 
Akkommodation '  (p.  93).  W.  always  returns  with  especial  delight 
and  emphasis  to  the  parable  of  the  sower.  Here  is  the  real  Jesus : 
here  we  may  find  what  he  really  considered  himself  to  be.  He  is 
a  teacher.  Teaching  is  his  true  mission.  In  Mark,  throughout 
the  Galilaean  period  we  find  him  teaching,  not  about  his  Messiah- 
ship,  not  even  about  the  future  Kingdom,  but  what  comes  in  his 
way,  about  true  morality  and  true  religion.  Even  in  Jerusalem 
he  does  not  teach  about  the  Kingdom,  though  he  twice  uses  the 
well-known  term.     The  section  viii.  27-x.  stands  by  itself. 

W.  never  faces  the  difficulty  why  Jesus,  if  he  so  deliberately 
turned  away  from  all  ideas  of  political  Messiahship,  yet  allowed 
his  followers,  and  allowed  the  crowd,  to  think  he  was  the  Messiah. 
Why  did  he  play  with  such  a  dangerous  term  ?  Is  not  another 
solution  also  conceivable  ?  Is  it  not  possible  that  much  of  the 
'  political '  hopes  of  Jesus — as  they  gradually  ripened  before  and 
during  the  days  at  Jerusalem — have  been  deliberately  removed 
by  the  Evangelists  ?  They  had  been  so  completely  falsified  by 
the  event.  The  event  showed  that  the  only  possible  Messiah  that 
Jesus  could  have  been  was  a  Messiah  who  attained  his  kingdom 
by  suffering  and  death. 

Or  may  we  argue  that  this  '  suffering '  Messiah  was  not  merely 
the  creation  of  the  '  event,'  but  partly  the  creation  of  Jesus  him- 
self, in  so  far  as  he  adopted  and  modified  the  'Son  of  man'  Messiah 
of  the  apocalyptic  seers  ?  We  have  also  already  seen  that  the 
'political'  elements  in  the  world-drama  were  to  be,  as  it  were, 
God's  business  rather  than  the  Messiah's.  It  is  in  consonance 
with  the  character  of  Jesus  that  the  Roman  question,  and  the 
supremacy  of  Israel  as  an  independent  nation,  should  have  been 
thrust  into  the  background  or  dropped.  It  was  the  moral  regene- 
ration of  Israel  he  was  keen  about,  not  its  'political'  glory. 
Again,  if  Jesus  had  come  to  realize  that  before  God  disclosed  him 
as  '  the  Man  from  heaven '  he  might  have  first  to  die,  the  detailed 
predictions  of  his  sufferings,  death,  and  Parousia  would  easily  have 
grown  up.  He  was  the  Messiah,  and  he  came  to  Jerusalem  to 
assume  his  Messianic  functions.  Was  it  to  be  without  the  interlude 
of  death,  or  was  it  to  be  after  death  ?  He  may  have  gradually 
come  to  believe  in  the  second  alternative,  and  have  stated  it  to 
his  disciples.  Yet  he  could  not  refuse  or  deny  any  Messianic 
greetings  he  might  receive,  for  in  God's  own  good  time  he  would, 
indeed,  be  revealed  as  Messiah.  This  hypothesis  may  conceivably 
be  nearer  the  truth  than  either  Pfleiderer's  or  W  's,  but  it  is,  and 
remains,  like  theirs,  a  mere  hypothesis,  which  the  material  at  our 
command  can  never  disprove  or  prove.  W.  is,  indeed,  strongly 
opposed  to  it,  because,  for  one  thing,  he  holds  that  Jesus  never 


264  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [X.  46-52 

called  himself,  or  believed  himself  to  be,  the  '  Son  of  man.'  He 
argues  that  the  section  in  Mark  viii.  27-x.  is  dominated  by  certain 
ideas  and  terms  which  are  not  those  of  the  historic  Jesus.  The 
'  Son  of  man '  who  is  prominent  in  this  section  is  a  transfigured 
and  heavenly  Messiah,  in  opposition  to  the  earthly  Messiah  of  the 
Jews.  Jesus  dies  upon  earth  to  enter  into  his  heavenly  glory. 
His  followers  are  to  follow  the  same  path.  They,  too,  through 
martyrdom,  are  to  enter  life  and  glory  and  the  Kingdom  of  God. 
In  this  section  Jesus  projects  himself  (i.e.  is  made  to  project  him- 
self) not  only  into  his  own  future,  but  into  the  future  of  his 
community.  This  conception  of  the  sufifering  Messiah  is  not  to  be 
accounted  for  even  by  Isaiah  liii.  To  the  repeated  predictions  in 
Mark  that  the  Son  of  man  must  suffer  and  die  no  proof  from 
Scripture  is  appended.  There  is,  therefore,  a  great  jump  from  the 
true  and  original  Messiah  to  this  other  sort  of  Messiah,  who  had 
only  the  name  in  common,  and  was  really  no  true  Messiah  at  all. 
This  jump  cannot  be  explained  except  post  factv/m.  The  old 
Messiah  was  abolished  by  the  crucifixion,  and  with  the  resurrec- 
tion a  new  one  began.  The  Messiah  upon  the  cross,  a  paradoxical 
contradiction  in  terms,  became  the  shibboleth  of  a  new  faith,  the 
foundation  of  the  Christian  gospel.  The  result  of  the  death  of 
Jesus  was  antedated  and  changed  into  his  purpose.  How  far  this 
argumentation  is  convincing  is  one  thing;  as  to  the  brilliancy 
and  clearness  with  which  W.  puts  it  forward  there  can  be  no 
question.  It  may  also  be  noted  that,  as  Holtzmann  has  also  stated, 
there  is  little  allusion  to  Isaiah  liii.  in  the  Synoptics.  Luke  xxii. 
37  is  isolated.  We  have  no  direct  evidence  that  Isaiah  liiL  played 
an  important  part  in  the  consciousness  and  thought  of  Jesus. 


CHAPTER  XI 

i-ii.    The  Entry  into  Jebusalem 

(Op.  Matt.  xxi.  i-i  I ;  Luke  xix.  28-38) 

1  And  when  they  came  nigh   to   Jerusalem,  unto   Bethphage 
and  Bethany,  at  the  mount  of  Olives,  he  sent  forth  two  of  his 

2  disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Go  to  the  village  before  you :  and 
immediately  as  ye  enter  it,  ye  will  find  an  ass's  colt  tied,  whereon 

3  no  man  has  yet  sat ;  loose  it  and  bring  it  here.     And  if  any  man 
say  unto  you.  Why  do  ye  this  ?  say  ye.  The  Lord  has  need  of 

4  it,  and  he  will  send  it  back  again   here   at  once.'     And  they 
departed,  and  found  the  colt  tied  by  the  gate  outside  in  the  open 


XL  i-ii]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  265 

5  place ;  and  they  loosed  it.     And  some  men  who  stood  there  said 

6  unto  them, '  What  do  ye,  loosing  the  colt  ?'  And  they  said  unto 
them  even  as  Jesus  had  commanded:  and  they  permitted  them 

7  to  take  it.     And  they  brought  the  colt  to  Jesus,  and  laid  their 
g  cloaks  upon  it;  and  he  sat  upon  it.    And  many  spread  their  cloaks 

upon  the  way:  and  others  strewed  plants  which  they  cut  from 

9  the  fields.  And  they  that  went  before,  and  they  that  followed, 
kept  crying :  '  Hosanna ;  blessed  be  he  that  cometh  in  the  name 

10  of  the  Lord :  blessed  be  the  kingdom  of  our  father  David  that  is 
coming ;  Hosanna  in  the  heights.' 

11  And  Jesus  entered  into  Jerusalem,  and  into  the  temple:  and 
when  he  had  looked  round  at  everything  there,  as  the  hour  was 
late,  he  went  out  unto  Bethany  with  the  Twelve. 

Here  begins  the  last  section  of  the  Gospel.  It  can  be  divided 
into  two  parts,  the  first  telling  the  story  of  the  entry  into  Jeru- 
salem, the  conflict  with  the  authorities  and  the  apocalyptic 
discourse,  and  extending  over  chapters  xi.,  xii.  and  xiii. ;  the 
second  recording  the  story  of  the  Passion,  the  entombment  and 
the  resurrection  (xiv.  to  end).  'The  whole  narrative  of  the 
ministry  at  Jerusalem  is  dominated  by  one  sole  thought :  Jesus 
is  the  Christ  who  must  fulfil  the  prophecies  and  achieve  the 
salvation  of  the  world  through  his  death:  he  knew  his  own 
destiny  and  the  future  of  humanity.  Les  616ments  de  cette 
demonstration,  pris  de  cdt^  et  d'autre,  se  pr^sentent  en  d^sordre. 
It  is  very  probable  that  the  story  of  the  Messianic  avowal  on  the 
Mount  of  Olives  and  that  of  the  purification  of  the  Temple  were 
furnished  to  Mark  by  tradition.  He  had  at  his  disposal  a  short 
text  which  he  has  expanded  {im  texte  assez  court  qu'il  a  glosf} ' 
(E.  S.  I.  p.  96). 

1.  Whether  Jesus  had  already  friends  in  Bethany,  which  was 
a  village  on  the  south-east  side  of  the  slopes  of  the  Mount  of  Olives, 
is  uncertain,  but  it  seems  likely. 

2.  '  The  village  before  you.'  Holtzmann  says  this  village  was 
Bethany,  but  the  text  seems  to  make  a  distinction  between  the 
two. 

The  young  ass  is  that  ass — '  the  colt,  the  foal  of  an  ass ' — of 
Zech.  ix.  9.  Jesus  here  implicitly  proclaims  himself  as  King  and 
Messiah.  If  this  tale  be  true,  Jesus  is,  to  say  the  least,  not  afi:aid 
to  take  action  which  would  imply  that  he  regards  himself,  and 
wishes  others  to  regard  him,  as  the  '  political '  Messiah  predicted 
by  the  prophets. 


EAST  LONDON  FUND  FOR  THE  JEWS. 


I  ^nrlfacf  and  Rftfp.r^nr.ft  I  ibrarv. 


266  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XI.  i-ii 

3.  '  The  Lord.'  Jesus  here  for  the  first  time  gives  himself  this 
name.     The  sub-intention  is  '  the  Messiah.' 

'  At  once,'  i.e.  Jesus  will  send  the  ass  back  as  soon  as  he  has 
done  with  it. 

4.  TTjOo?  Tr)v  6vpav  e^a>  e-rrl  tov  diJL<}>6Sov.  Dr  Weymouth 
translates  :  '  at  the  street  door  of  a  house.'  '  The  foal  was  tied  up 
at  a  house-door,  but  outside,  not  in  the  house,  but  in  the  street ' 
(Swete).  It  is  at  least  strange  that  Justin  says  that  the  ass  was 
attached  to  a  vine.  Have  we  here  a  fulfilment  of  a  Messianic 
prophecy,  and  was  d/i<j)6Bov  originally  dfj.Tre\ov  ?  The  Septuagfint 
of  Genesis  xlix.  1 1  runs :  Sea-fiev<ov  •trpo<;  afnreKov  rov  TrrnXov  avrov, 
Koi  Ttj  eXiKi  TOV  TTwXov  TTji;  ovov  avrov.  Strauss  suggested  that 
the  origin  of  the  tied  ass  is  to  be  sought  here  {Leben  Jesu,  ist  ed., 
II.  p.  294). 

8.  A  crowd  accompanies  him  to  the  gates  of  the  city.  They 
strew  leaves  and  herbs  upon  the  ground.  o-rtySaSe?  are  not 
branches,  but  '  layers  of  leaves,'  as  the  margin  of  the  Revised 
Version  has  it.     For  the  garments,  cp.  2  Kings  ix.   13. 

9.  Psalm  cxviii.  26.  The  right  translation  is :  '  Blessed  in  the 
name  of  the  Lord  be  he  that  cometh.'  Yahweh  is  invoked  and 
asked  to  bless.  But  perhaps  though  this  is  the  correct  translation 
of  the  Hebrew,  the  Evangelist  took  it  to  mean  '  Blessed  be  he  that 
cometh  in  the  name  of  (i.e.  as  sent  by)  the  Lord.'  '  He  that 
cometh '  is  almost  a  technical  term  for  the  Messiah  in  Matt.  xi.  3. 
'Hosanna'  is  the  Hebrew  'save,'  with  the  enclitic  'na'  added  to 
the  imperative.  It  is  an  appeal  for  help  to  the  king  (cp.  2  Sam. 
xiv.  4 ;  2  Kings  vi.  26)  or  to  God. 

10.  ' Hosanna  in  the  heights '  (cp.  Job  xvi.  19,  XXV.  2).  'Grant 
salvation  in  heaven,  so  that  salvation  may  descend  upon  Messiah 
on  earth.'     (So  Weiss.) 

Dalman  points  out  that  'save  in  the  heights'  is  scarcely  an 
explicable  Hebrew  or  Jewish  phrase.  The  explanation  given  by 
Weiss  is  somewhat  strained.  Help  should  come  from  heaven, 
rather  than  be  given  in  heaven.  Dalman  thinks  that  Mark,  like 
Matthew  and  Luke,  misunderstood  the  meaning  of  Hosanna.  They 
supposed  that  it  meant  praise  or  glory  to  Jesus  the  Messiah.  Hence 
Mark  adds  '  in  the  heights'  on  the  lines  of  Psalm  cxlviii.  i,  '  praise 
him  in  the  heights,'  where  the  Septuagint  has  iv  rot?  v-\}ria-Toii 
as  here.  Jesus,  according  to  Mark,  is  welcomed  by  this  cry  as  the 
Messianic  King.  'Hosanna'  becomes  equivalent  to  'Hail.'  If, 
however,  the  cry  was  merely  '  Save  now,  O  God.  Blessed  in  the 
name  of  the  Lord  is  he  that  cometh,'  Dalman  thinks  that  nothing 


XI.  I -II]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  267 

Messianic  was  intended.  'The  teacher  and  wonder-worker  of 
Nazareth  was  greeted  with  joyous  cries  and  benedictions.'  The 
entry  received  its  Messianic  colouring  a  good  while  after  the 
event  occurred  (Dalman,  Die  Worte  Jesu,  i.  pp.  181,  182).  So, 
too,  Wrede. 

II.  Jesus,  as  a  new-comer,  on  this,  perhaps  his  first,  visit  to 
the  capital,  inspects  the  Temple  and  its  surroundings.  Loisy  takes 
another  line.  Mark  does  not  mean  that  Jesus  goes  to  look  at 
things  as  a  provincial  who  sees  the  capital  for  the  first  time. 
'Marc  veut  seulement  preparer  la  sc^ne  du  lendemain.'  Jesus 
may  have  been  at  Jerusalem  before,  at  former  festivals.  Never- 
theless Mark's  narrative  does  exclude  any  previous  visit  to 
Jerusalem  since  the  opening  of  his  ministry.  To  explain  the 
attitude  of  Jesus  one  must  assume  something  new.  That  new 
element  is  his  ministry  and  its  exercise.  If  he  was  in  Jerusalem 
before,  it  was  as  an  ordinary  pilgrim.  Now  '  il  fait  la  visite  de 
Messie,  et  cette  visite  est  la  premiere '  {E.  S.  11.  pp.  268,  269). 

W.  acutely  says :  '  Rationalising  is  here  unpermissible.  Jesus 
did  not  order  the  ass  beforehand,  and  make  a  previous  arrange- 
ment with  its  owners.  He  foreknows  the  chance  coincidence, 
because  God,  who  directs  what  is  apparent  chance,  is  with  him. 
The  ass  serves  no  ordinary  purpose;  it  is  the  ass  of  Messianic 
prophecy.  Thus  Jesus  proclaims  himself  as  the  Messiah.  According 
to  Zech.  xiv.  4,  Yahweh  was  to  appear  on  the  Mount  of  Olives, 
and  popular  Jewish  faith  held  that  the  Messiah  would  appear 
there. 

'Yet  this  imposing  demonstration  has  no  effect.  Neither 
priests  nor  Romans  pay  any  attention.  And  yet  the  Romans 
might  have  been  expected  to  take  umbrage.  Hence  one  can 
hardly  believe  that  Jesus  was  the  responsible  author  of  the  inci- 
dent. If  it  took  place,  it  must  have  happened  without  his  intention 
and  have  possessed  no  special  importance.  It  is  conceivable  that 
the  populace  in  a  moment  of  excitement  acclaimed  him  as  Messiah, 
and  it  is  also  not  improbable  that  he  made  no  actual  protest 
against  their  doing  so. 

'  The  Gospel  tradition  lets  us  see  that  Jesus's  journey  was  no 
mere  harmless  pilgrimage,  but  that  there  was  a  special  reason  for 
it  and  a  special  purpose.  He  must  have  arrived  there  some  while 
before  the  Passover.  Mark  tries  to  limit  the  period  between  his 
entry  and  his  death  to  a  week,  but  the  material  can  hardly  be 
fitted  in  to  so  short  a  time.  He  seems  to  have  acquired  acquaint- 
ances and  connections  in  Jerusalem,  and  these  cannot  be  accounted 
for  on  the  strength  of  previous  visits,  when '  [if  such  took  place] 
'he  would  not   have   been   known  as  the   great   prophet   from 


268  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  \XI.  i-ii 

Galilee.  In  Bethany  he  seems  to  have  laid  the  foundations  of 
the  subsequent  Christian  community  in  Jerusalem.  In  xiy.  49 
he  says :  '  I  have  been  daily  with  you  in  the  Temple,  teaching ' ; 
two  days  would  not  justify  '  daily.' 

•  Thus  the  concourse  of  people  who  accompanied  him  from  the 
borders  of  Judaea  (x.  i),  who  passed  by  Jericho  (x.  46),  and 
descended  the  Mount  of  Olives  with  him,  did  not  go  with  him 
because  of  the  festival,  but  because  of  himself,  in  expectant 
anticipation  of  what  he  might  do  in  the  metropolis.  It  seems 
very  likely  that  the  people  were  inclined  to  regard  him  as  the 
Messiah,  and  to  interpret  his  journey  to  Jerusalem  Messianically. 
The  step  from  prophet  to  Messiah  was  easily  taken ;  false  prophet 
{y}f6vBoTrpo<f>ijrri<!)  and  false  Messiah  (yjrevBoypia-ro^)  in  Josephus 
and  the  Gospels  mean  much  the  same  thing. 

J.  Weiss  holds  that  the  entry,  as  described  by  Mark,  is,  in 
many  respects,  unhistorical.  Jesus  had  earnestly  kept  back,  and 
refrained  from,  all  Messianic  claims.  What  purpose  could  such  a 
demonstration  have  served  ?  Is  it  conceivable  that  Jesus  would 
himself  have  given  occasion  for  any  Messianic  proclamation  and 
acclamation  by  the  excited  populace  ?  Such  an  entry  was  not 
referred  to  at  the  trial.  If  any  hailed  him  as  the  Messiah,  it  was 
his  entourage,  not  those  to  whom  he  came.  It  is,  at  any  rate, 
highly  remarkable  that,  in  Matt.  xxi.  1 1,  upon  the  question  being 
put  by  the  excited  populace,  'Who  is  this  man?'  the  reply  is 
given, '  It  is  Jesus,  the  prophet  of  Nazareth.'  It  is  not  said :  '  It 
is  Jesus  the  Messiah.'  Hence  some  others  agree  with  Dalman 
that  the  entry  was  not  '  Messianic '  at  all.  The  great  prophet 
enters  the  city  amid  the  acclaim  of  his  followers :  his  fame  has 
gone  before  him,  and  he  is  greeted  with  enthusiasm.  But  this  is 
all.  The  view  of  Schweitzer  is  highly  peculiar.  He  supposes 
that  the  entry  into  Jerusalem  is  'for  Jesus  Messianic,  for  the 
people  un-Messianic'  Jesus  desired  to  fulfil,  unknown  to  others 
(iiisgeheim),  the  prophecy  of  Zech.  ix.  9.  Yet  the  ovation  which 
he  received  was  more  than  the  reception  given  to  a  teacher. 
Hence,  for  this  and  other  reasons,  Schweitzer  supposes  (it  is  part 
of  his  whole  theory)  that  the  people  thought  that  Jesus  (as  we 
are  told  in  viii.  28)  was  the  returned  Elijah,  who  was  to  precede 
the  Messiah.  Jesus  plays  with  his  own  Messianic  consciousness 
and  secret,  for  he  is  convinced  that  the  people  will  not  understand 
or  guess.  It  is  only  Judas  who,  later  on,  betrays  his  secret  (that 
he  is  the  Messiah)  to  the  High  Priest  ( Von  Reimarus  zu  Wrede, 
PP-  391.  392)-  It  is  very  doubtful  whether  this  newest  theory 
will  hold  the  field. 

Merx  holds  that  the  Messianic  entry  is  a  late  interpolation. 
It  has  been  inserted  in  a  geographically  unsuitable  place.     Jesus 


XI.  I2-I4J  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  269 

has  reached  Bethphage  (as  Matthew  rightly  reads),  which  was  not 
a  village,  but  a  farm,  of  importance  because  it  marked  the  oflBcial 
boundary  of  Jerusalem  (Merx  proves  this  by  citations  from  the 
Talmud).  There  was  no  village  in  front  of  them.  Bethany  lay 
behind  them.  Jesus  rode  on  an  ass  into  Jerusalem  as  many  others 
had  done ;  afterwards,  after  his  death,  the  ass  was  interpreted 
Messianically,  and  the  story,  as  we  now  find  it,  spun  out.  John 
xii.  14  (especially  in  the  Syriac  version,  where  it  simply  says 
'  Jesus  rode  on  an  ass ')  gives  some  support  to  this  theory.  Merx, 
like  all  who  disbelieve  in  Jesus's  Messianic  claim,  lays  great  stress 
upon  Matt.  xxi.  11,  and  all  the  more  stress,  as  he  upholds  the  (at 
least  comparative)  priority  of  Matthew  over  Mark. 

Other  scholars  hold  that  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that 
Jesus  did  not  approach  or  enter  somewhat  in  the  way  described. 
So  Loisy.  '  La  consigne  provisoire  qui  avait  ^t6  donn6e  k  C6sarfe 
de  Philippe  etait  maintenant  rompue.  L'heure  ^tait  imminente, 
et  la  voix  du  peuple  ne  faisait  que  pr61uder  k  la  voix  de  Dieu ' 
(E.  S.  I.  p.  215).  Dr  Carpenter  also  thinks  that  the  incident  really 
happened;  the  ride  was  planned,  and  called  forth  response  both  from 
the  disciples  and  the  general  crowd.  Yet  the  question  remains : 
why,  if  his  Kingdom  was  to  be  so  purely  spiritual,  so  unlike  that  of 
the  Messiah  of  the  prophets,  did  he  nevertheless  seek  to  fulfil  the 
Messianic  prophecies?  Why  did  he  raise  the  very  expectations 
which  he  thought  outward  and  wrong,  which  he  did  not  desire  to 
fulfil  ?  Gould  grasps  the  nettle  boldly,  but  his  words  are  uncon- 
vincing. He  says  •  '  The  acceptance  of  him  as  King,  and  not 
merely  as  prophet,  was  what  he  demanded.'  His  entry  was  'a 
public  proclamation  of  his  Messianic  claim.'  But  his  programme 
remains  unchanged.  He  will  still  only  be  the  teacher  and  bene- 
fector.  His  Kingship  is  service,  and  so  remains.  '  The  multitude 
who  followed  him  thought  that  with  the  announcement  of  the 
claim  the  programme  would  change.  But  the  unchanged  pro- 
gramme means  that  Jesus,  just  as  he  was,  claimed  Kingship  and 
would  be  King  only  by  spiritual  enforcements.  The  distinct  claim 
to  be  a  King  is  followed  immediately  by  the  revolutionising  of  the 
whole  idea  of  Kingship.' 

12-14.    The  Barren  Fig  Tree 
(Gp.  Matt.  xxi.  18,  19) 

12  And  on  the  morrow,  when  they  left  Bethany,  he  was  hungry : 

13  and  seeing  a  fig  tree  afar  off  having  leaves,  he  went  up  to  it  to 
see  if  he  should  find  anything  on  it :  and  when  he  came  to  it,  he 


270  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XI.  12-14 

14  found  nothing  but  leaves ;  for  it  was  not  the  season  for  figs.  And 
Jesus  spoke  and  said  unto  the  tree:  '  Let  no  man  eat  fmit  of  thee 
again  for  ever.'     And  his  disciples  heard  it. 

A  good  deal  has  been  written  about  this  story,  which  finds  its 
continuation  in  20-25.  Has  it  any  historic  basis  whatever  ?  Has 
a  parable,  such  as  that  of  Luke  xiii.  6-9,  been  turned  first  into  an 
allegory,  and  then  externalised  into  a-  miracle  ?  For  the  purpose 
of  this  book  it  is  needless  to  discuss  these  very  hypothetical  ques- 
tions. The  story  has,  in  any  case,  no  moral  or  religious  value  for 
us  to-day. 

14.  For  the  question  as  to  the  date  when  figs  ripen  in  Galilee 
and  Judaea  reference  must  be  made  to  the  larger  commentaries. 
There  seems  no  reason  to  suppose  that  fig  trees  had  not  usually 
their  leaves  in  April,  though  Swete  asserts  this  ('the  tree  was 
prematurely  in  leaf),  and  then  adds  the  strange  remark:  'it  was 
reasonable  to  expect  a  corresponding  precocity  in  regard  to  the 
figs.'  Jesus  bids  the  fig  tree  be  barren  for  ever.  It  seems  a 
strange  thing  to  do,  for  the  tree  was  not  in  fault.  If  the  story 
has  any  historic  basis,  we  cannot  imagine  that  Jesus  acted  in  so 
irrational  a  way  as  this.  At  the  least  the  story  must  have  been 
greatly  perverted  from  what  actually  took  place. 

Holtzmann  and  Menzies  think  Jesus  spoke  of  the  fig  tree, 
which  had  leaves  but  no  fruit,  as  an  image  of  the  Pharisees  or 
Jews.  Their  piety  was  mere  outward  foliage  and  show ;  there  was 
no  fruit  of  holy  deeds  and  holy  life.  Such  people  must  become 
drier  and  drier ;  they  are  rejected  of  God,  and  only  fit  for 
destruction. 

Dr  Carpenter  points  out  that  Luke  omits  the  story  of  the  fig 
tree,  and  that  in  lieu  of  it  he  has  a  parable  of  a  fig  tree.  See 
Luke  xiii.  6-9.  Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  the  parable  was  the 
original.  The  idea  of  it  has  become  materialised  in  the  story  [the 
idea,  namely,  of  Israel's  religious  barrenness  and  rejection].  For 
'  the  report  of  the  Teacher's  word,  as  it  was  passed  from  hand  to 
hand,  dropped  one  detail  on  its  transit  in  one  direction,  took  up 
another  along  a  diflferent  line,  and  thus  gradually  split  into  two 
distinct  shapes.     In  one  of  these  the  meaning  of  the  parable  was 

clearly  retained.    The  other  was  remembered  as  a  story a  fig  tree 

in  full  leaf — a  doom — a  withering — but  its  significance  was  gone : 
it  became  a  mere  anecdote,  which  of  course  attached  itself  in  time 
to  Jesus.  Then  it  was  fitted  with  a  place  and  date,  due  possibly 
to  some  actual  reminiscence,  and  in  this  shape  it  was  incorporated 
into  the  traditions.  But  in  sifting  the  material  available  for  his 
work  the  third  Evangelist  had  sufficient  insight  to  choose  the 


XI.  15-19]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  271 

parable'  {First  Three  Gospels,  p.  178).  J.  Weiss,  too,  and  Loisy 
have  similar  explanations.  To  them  also  the  story  as  it  stands 
is  a  'legend.'  But  what  about  Peter  and  his  reminiscences  in 
verse  21  ? 

15-19.    The  Purification  of  the  Temple 
{Gp.  Matt.  xxi.  12,  13,  17;  Luke  xix.  45-48) 

15  And  they  came  to  Jerusalem:  and  Jesus  went  into  the  temple, 
and  began  to  drive  out  them  that  sold  and  bought  in  the  temple, 
and  he  overthrew  the  tables  of  the  money-changers,  and  the  seats 

it  of  them  that  sold  doves ;  and  he  would  not  allow  anyone  to  carry 
a  vessel  through  the  temple. 

17  And  he  taught,  saying  unto  them,  'Is  it  not  written.  My  house 
shall  be  called  a  house  of  prayer  for  all  nations  ?  but  ye  have 

18  made  it  a  den  of  thieves.'  And  the  chief  priests  and  the  scribes 
heard  it,  and  sought  how  they  might  destroy  him :  for  they  feared 

19  him,  because  all  the  people  were  amazed  at  his  teaching.  And 
when  evening  was  come,  he  went  out  of  the  city. 

1 5.  For  the  facts  as  to  what  actually  went  on  in  the  precincts 
of  the  Temple  and  'the  Court  of  the  Gentiles'  see  Additional 
Note  21.  It  is  possible  that  if  Mark's  narrative  depends  on  an 
earlier  written  source,  the  purification  incident  followed  there 
immediately  on  the  entry.  Verse  1 1  may  be  redactional  to  make 
a  break  and  allow  for  the  story  of  the  fig  tree.  And  27  seq. 
would  follow  well  on  18,  19.  Some  would  see  in  the  purification 
an  act  of  Messianic  authority. 

16.  Mark  only.  See  the  same  Additional  Note.  Not  to 
permit  anyone  to  carry  a  vessel  through  the  Temple  shows  Jesus 
in  an  unexpected  light.  If  a  Rabbi  were  so  particular,  the  German 
theologians  would  call  it  externalism.  When  an  external  act 
shows  a  lack  of  reverence  for  the  House  of  God,  he  is  rightly  keen 
to  condemn  it.     It  is  usually  supposed  that  what  was  objected  to 

-  was  the  use  of  the  Temple  as  a  short  cut  from  one  quarter  of  the 
city  to  another.  This  had  already  been  prohibited  by  Jewish 
law.  Josephus  says  that  no  one  was  allowed  to  carry  a  vessel 
into  the  Temple  (Against  Apion,  II.  8).  Loisy  thinks  that  16  is 
perhaps  secondary. 

17.  The  allusion  is  to  Isaiah  Ivi.  7  and  Jeremiah  vii.  11. 
The  Isaiah  passage  has  '  a  special  appropriateness  in  the  present 


272  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XI.  15-19 

context;  for  the  part  of  the  lepov  which  the  Lord  has  just 
reclaimed  from  secular  use  was  the  Court  of  the  Gentiles,  where 
alone  within  the  precincts  Gentiles  were  at  liberty  to  pray'  (Swete). 
The '  thieves '  may  refer  to  the  cheating  practised  by  sellers,  or  the 
reference  may  be  more  general.  The  Temple  has  become  a  meeting 
place  of  scamps.  If  this  story  is  historical,  we  have  to  assume  that 
Jesus  at  first  occupied  a  position  of  some  power  in  Jerusalem. 
His  followers  are  numerous  enough  to  execute  his  orders  in  the 
Temple,  and  important  enough  to  allow  him  and  them  to  be 
undisturbed  in  their  unusual  and  high-handed  proceedings.  Of 
his  teaching  no  specimen  is  given.  The  Scribes  and  priests  are 
afraid  to  lay  hands  upon  him,  though  they  would  fain  get  rid  of 
him. 

J.  Weiss  accepts  the  historical  character  of  the  story,  but 
thinks  that  it  must  have  happened  at  an  early  period  in  Jesus's 
career.  The  fourth  Evangelist  places  the  event  at  the  opening 
of  Jesus's  ministry,  and  Weiss  agrees  with  him.  His  reasons  are 
twofold.  First,  the  attempt  of  Jesus  could  not  have  been  success- 
fully carried  out  at  the  end  of  his  ministry,  when  the  attention  of 
the  authorities  must  have  been  directed  to  all  his  doings.  He 
would  have  been  quickly  stopped.  Secondly,  Jesus  would  hardly 
have  shown  at  the  end  of  his  life  this  great  interest  in  the  purity 
of  the  Temple.  Would  he  have  cared  to  make  this  effort  for  mere 
outward  worship  ?  But  it  is  dangerous  to  abandon  Mark  for  John. 
A  more  probable  view  would  be  that  what  Jesus  did  was  something 
much  smaller  than  is  here  represented.  Everything  tends  to  be 
magnified  in  the  Gospel  report — the  miracles,  the  opposition,  the 
attention  excited,  the  renown,  the  doings,  and  all.  If  the  Gospel 
narratives  were  accurate  and  unexaggerated,  the  silence  of  Josephus 
would  be  scarcely  explicable. 

18.  'They  sought  to  destroy  him, /br  they  feared  him, /or 
the  people  were  amazed  at  his  teaching.'  This  is  possible ;  but  it 
is  more  probable,  as  W.  says,  that  the  first '  for '  should  be  rendered 
'but.' 

20-25.    The  Fig  Tree  and  Faith 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxi.  20-22,  xvii.  20,  vi.  14,  xviii.  35) 

20  And  in  the  morning,  as  they  passed  by,  they  saw  the  fig  tree 

21  dried  up  from  the  roots.     And  Peter  remembered,  and  said  unto 
him,  'Master,  behold,  the  fig  tree  which  thou  cursedst  is  dried  up.' 

;2,  23  And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  them, '  Have  faith  in  God.     For 
verily  I  say  unto  you,  that  whoever  should  say  unto  this  mountain, 


XL  20-25]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  273 

Lift  thyself  up,  and  hurl  thyself  into  the  sea;  and  did  not  doubt 
in  his  heart,  but  believed  that  his  word  would  come  to  pass :  to 

24  him  it  would  come  to  pass.  Therefore  I  say  unto  you.  What 
things  soever  ye  pray  for  and  ask,  believe  that  ye  have  received 

25  them,  and  they  will  be  yours.  And  when  ye  stand  and  pray,  if  ye 
have  aught  against  any  one,  forgive  him,  that  your  Father  who  is 
in  heaven  may  also  forgive  you  your  trespasses.' 

22.  Mark  has  used  the  story  of  the  fig  tree  in  an  awkward 
manner.  To  draw  from  the  success  of  Jesus's  imprecation  a 
lesson  on  faith  is  putting  it  to  strange  uses,  and  giving  a  bad 
example  of  what  faith  can  do.  To  say  that  the  success  of  the 
imprecation  was  due  to  Jesus's  faith  in  God,  his  conviction  that 
God  would  fulfil  his  prayer,  suggests  strange  uses  of  faith 
and  prayer.  Is  the  believer,  as  Loisy  rightly  says,  '  selon  son 
caprice,'  to  ask  for,  and  to  see  accomplished,  any  miracles  which 
come  into  his  head — to  make  the  vine  which  gave  no  grapes 
sterile  for  ever,  or  to  remove  mountains,  'a  son  gr6,'  which  he 
might  like  better  to  see  elsewhere  ?  Only  those  miracles  which 
the  interests  of  faith  justify  can  be  referred  to.  Yet  the  most 
authentic  utterances  of  Jesus  on  the  efficacy  of  prayer  have  a 
form  almost  as  absolute  as  23,  24  (Matt.  vii.  7-1 1).  The  artificiality 
of  the  connection  between  the  successful  curse  of  the  fig  tree  and 
the  lesson  about  faith  is  less  the  apparent  exaggeration  of  the 
assertion  than  the  incoherence  of  the  whole  passage,  seeing  that 
the  malediction  of  the  fig  tree  was  not,  properly  speaking,  either 
an  act  of  faith  or  a  praj'er  {E.  S.  II.  p.  288).  The  story  is  used 
as  a  peg  on  which  to  hang  utterances  of  Jesus  which  were  not 
originally  connected  with  it.  The  mountain  and  the  lake  suggest 
Galilee  rather  than  Jerusalem.  Menzies  thinks  that  the  meaning 
is  that  with  God's  help  there  is  still  hope  for  Israel.  Jesus  still 
has  faith.     This  interpretation  seems  strained. 

24.  Again  one  must  notice  the  immense  (and  probably  his- 
torical) stress  which  Jesus  lays  upon  faith.     Cp.  Matt.  vii.  7-1 1. 

We  cannot  to-day  accept  the  doctrine  as  here  laid  down.  As 
to  the  power  of  faith  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  prayer  on  the  other, 
there  can  be  no  doubt.  Nevertheless,  we  shall,  I  think,  be  com- 
pelled to  admit  that  there  are  limits  to  faith,  which  Jesus  would 
not  have  recognized  or  allowed.  Verse  24  shows  that  you  cannot 
explain  away  23  as  a  mere  Oriental  exaggeration  and  picturesque 
way  of  speaking. 

25.  An  addition  which  is  out  of  place.  It  is  perhaps  an 
insertion  due  to  Matt.  vi.  14.     The  expression, '  Father  in  heaven,' 

M.  18 


274  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XL  20-25 

is  only  here  found  in  Mark.  W.  says  that  Mark  may  have  known 
the  Lord's  Prayer,  which  may  already  have  been  employed  in  the 
community,  but  did  not  venture  to  ascribe  it  as  a  whole  to  Jesus. 
Jesus  with  him  gives  principles  for  prayer,  but  no  formula. 
Cp.  xiv.  38  for  another  parallel  to  the  Lord's  Prayer  in  Mark.  22-24 
find  their  parallels  in  Matt.  xxi.  21,  22,  xvii.  20  and  Luke  xvii.  6, 
while  25  finds  its  parallel  not  only  in  Matt.  vi.  14,  but  also  in 
Matt,  xviii.  35.  Loisy  supposes  that  all  those  passages  go  back  to 
Q,  the  '  recueil  de  discours.'  The  primitive  sentence  was  probably 
something  like  this :  '  If  you  have  even  as  much  faith  as  a  grain 
of  mustard  seed,  you  could  say  to  this  mountain.  Remove  and  cast 
thyself  into  the  sea.'  Luke,  perhaps  influenced  by  the  fig  tree 
with  which  Mark  has  brought  the  saying  into  connection,  has 
substituted  '  sycamore  tree '  for  '  mountain.'  Observe  too,  that 
xvii.  20  in  Matthew  is  not  far  removed  from  xviii.  35.  All  the 
more  reason  to  believe  that  Mark  has  got  his  22-24  ^-nd  his  25 
from  Q.  He  has  reproduced  them  freely.  Verse  24  is  also  parallel 
with  Matt,  xviii.  19,  vii.  7-1 1.  Li  25  Mark  has  combined  the  lessons 
of  Matt.  V.  23,  24,  and  of  xviii.  35  (vi.  12-15).  Matthew  does  not 
here  reproduce  Mark's  25,  because  he  had  treated  the  subject 
before  so  fully.  It  must  be  admitted  that  it  does  seem  very 
probable  that  Mark  is  here  picking  and  choosing  from  a  more 
primary  source.  If  so,  what  becomes  of  W.'s  argument  as  to 
the  Lord's  Prayer  ?  Its  authenticity  becomes  immensely  more 
probable.  It  would  seem  likely  that  Matthew  transcribed  Q  in 
these  passages  more  accurately,  while,  as  Loisy  says,  Mark  repro- 
duced the  sayings  from  Q  '  freely,'  perhaps  even  from  memory. 
He  combines  them  awkwardly  into  a  speech  which  has  neither 
the  precision  of  personal  recollections  nor  the  exactitude  of  a 
regular  transcript  (^E.  S.  II.  p.  290). 

27-33-    The  Authority  of  John 
{Cp.  Matt.  xxi.  23-27;  Luke  xx.   1-8) 

27  And  they  came  again  to  Jerusalem  :  and  as  he  was  walking  in 
the  temple,  the  chief  priests,  and  the  scribes,  and  the  Elders  came 

28  up  to  him  and  said :  '  By  what  authority  doest  thou  these  things  ? 

29  and  who  gave  thee  this  authority  to  do  these  things  ? '  And  Jesus 
answered  and  said  unto  them,  'I  will  also  ask  of  you  one  question; 
do  ye  answer  me,  and  I  will  tell  you  by  what  authority  I  do  these 

30  things.     The  baptism  of  John,  was  it  from  heaven,  or  from  men? 

31  answer  me.'    And  they  deliberated  among  themselves,  saying, '  If 


XI.  27-33]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  275 

we  say,  From  heaven ;  he  will  say,  Why  then  did  ye  not  believe 

2  him  ?    Or  shall  we  say,  From  men  ? '    But  they  feared  the  people : 

3  for  all  held  John  to  be  really  a  prophet.  So  they  answered  and 
said  unto  Jesus, '  We  do  not  know.'  And  Jesus  said  unto  them, 
'Neither  do  I  tell  you  by  what  authority  I  do  these  things.' 

28.  'By  what  authority  doest  thou  these  things?'  The 
'things'  (ravTa)  can  only  mean  the  purification  of  the  Temple. 
The  verse  is  really  the  continuation  of  18. 

The  object  of  the  question  is  apparently  to  make  Jesus  declare 
himself.  If  he  let  others  acclaim  him  as  Messiah,  why  will  he  not 
definitely  himself  say  of  himself  that  the  Messiah  is  he  ?  Or,  at 
any  rate,  is  his  mission  of  God  ?  Does  he  claim  special  divine 
inspiration  ?     Has  he  a  direct  mandate  from  God  ? 

29.  True  to  the  policy  of  silence  and  semi-evasion  which  Jesus 
is  represented  as  adopting  towards  the  outer  world  (whether  he 
really  adopted  it  is  another  matter,  about  which  no  one  can  know 
for  certain),  he  asks  his  questioners  a  counter-question,  which, 
from  his  vantage-ground  of  knowing  the  inward  thoughts  of  his 
adversaries,  he  foresees  will  not  be  answered.  Under  the  word 
'  baptism '  we  must  include  John's  activity  and  teaching  as  a  whole. 
If  the  priests  had  answered  that  John's  mission  was  of  God,  the 
rejoinder  of  Jesus  would,  we  may  imagine,  have  been:  Why 
did  you  not  listen  to  him  ?  J.  Weiss  thinks  that  Jesus  could  only 
have  given  an  evasive  reply.  It  is  not  tactics,  but  his  attitude  to 
the  whole  Messiah  question,  which  compels  him  to  take  this  line. 
He  cannot  discuss  the  matter  with  these  people.  They  could  not 
understand  his  point  of  view. 

32.  The  construction  is  broken  off.  '  Or  shall  we  say.  From 
men  ? '  But  that  would  not  do,  they  said  to  themselves — so  one 
has  to  supply — for  they  feared  the  people. 

33.  The  ignorance  of  the  Scribes  is  mere  pretence.  They 
refused  to  believe  in  John,  but  their  sin  was  all  the  greater,  for 
they  knew,  or  at  any  rate  more  than  half-suspected,  that  John  was 
a  messenger  of  God.  Menzies  says  Jesus  held  that  he  need  not 
reply  to  their  question  because  by  their  own  rejoinder  they  had 
shown  that  they  could  not  appreciate  the  qualifications  of  a 
religious  teacher.  If  they  cannot  estimate  John  aright,  neither 
can  they  estimate  him.  If  the  purpose  of  Jesus's  question  was  not 
merely  to  evade  the  issue,  we  may  suppose,  with  Bernhard  Weiss, 
that  Jesus  refuses  to  answer  because,  for  his  Messianic  prerogatives, 
he  could  only  have  appealed  to  the  authority  of  the  Baptist ;  while 

18— 2 


276  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XI.  27-33 

the  untruthfulnesB  of  his  questioners  would  make  them  incapable 
of  receiving  the  witness  which  his  own  life  gave  to  his  Messianic 
claim.  Dr  Carpenter  thinks  Weiss's  suggestion  weak,  because 
there  is  no  trustworthy  evidence  (Matt.  iii.  14  is  not  such)  to 
show  that  John  applied  his  language  about  the  '  coming  one '  to 
Jesus,  or  that  he  recognized  him  as  the  Messiah.  On  the  other 
hand,  John's  doubts  are  clear,  Matt.  xi.  2.  How,  then,  could 
Jesus  have  appealed  to  the  authority  of  John  in  support  of  his 
own  claim?  It  may,  however,  be  that  the  Evangelists  meant  to 
give  the  meaning  suggested  by  B.  Weiss.  In  the  actual  historic 
scene  the  refusal  to  answer  mlist  have  meant  to  imply  that  the 
questioners  stand  condemned  by  their  incredulity  towards  a 
prophet  of  God.  If  they  had  answered, '  From  God,'  Loisy  supposes 
that  we  may  conceive  that  Jesus  would  have  said  that  John's 
testimony  to  the  near  advent  of  the  Kingdom  was  a  sufficient 
justification  of  his  own  authority.  This  seems  doubtful.  For  the 
one  does  not  follow  from  the  other.  Perhaps  all  that  Jesus  would 
have  replied  would  have  been :  '  Even  so  is  my  authority  from 
God.' 

The  whole  scene,  J.  Weiss  thinks,  confirms  his  view  that  the 
purification  of  the  Temple  episode  happened  early  in  the  ministry. 
The  attitude  of  the  Scribes  is  inconceivable,  he  says,  at  this  late 
period.  Why  should  they  not  deny  the  inspiration  of  John  ? 
Would  the  people  still  believe  in  him  after  his  imprisonment  and 
even  his  death  ?  But  one  cannot  get  rid  of  the  difficulties  of  the 
Synoptic  narrative  by  accepting  the  still  greater  difficulties  of  the 
Johannine. 


CHAPTER  XII 

1-12.    The  Parable  of  the  Vineyard 

(Gp.  Matt.  xxi.  33-46;  Luke  xx.  9-19) 

1  And  he  began  to  speak  unto  them  in  parables.  'A  man 
planted  a  vineyard,  and  set  an  hedge  around  it,  and  dug  out  a 
wine  press,  and  built  a  tower.     And  he  let  it  to  husbandmen,  and 

2  went  abroad.  And  at  the  proper  time  he  sent  to  the  husbandmen 
a  servant,  that  he  might  receive  from  the  husbandmen  his  share 

3  of  the  fruit  of  the  vineyard.     And  they  seized  him,  and  beat  him, 

4  and  sent  him  away  empty.    And  again  he  sent  unto  them  another 

5  servant ;  and  him  they  wounded  and  reviled.  And  again  he  sent 
another;  and  him  they  killed.     And  he  sent  many  others;  and 


XII.  1-12]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  277 

6  some  they  beat,  and  some  they  killed.  But  he  had  still  an  only 
and  well-beloved  son :  him  he  sent  last  unto  them,  saying,  They 

7  will  have  respect  for  my  son.  But  those  husbandmen  said  among 
themselves,  This  is  the  heir;    come,  let  us   kill   him,  and   the 

8  inheritance  will  be  ours.     So  they  seized  him,  and  killed  him,  and 

9  cast  him  out  of  the  vineyard.  What  will  the  lord  of  the  vineyard 
do  ?  he  will  come  and  destroy  the  husbandmen,  and  will  give  the 
vineyard  unto  others. 

10  'And  have  ye  not  read  this  passage  in  the  scripture:  The 
stone  which   the   builders   rejected  is  become  the  corner-stone. 

11  This  is  the  Lord's  doing,  and  it  is  marvellous  in  our  eyes?' 

12  And  they  sought  to  take  him  prisoner,  for  they  realized  that 
he  had  spoken  the  parable  against  them :  but  they  feared  the 
people,  so  they  left  him,  and  went  their  way. 

It  would  seem  very  doubtful  whether  this  parable  can  be 
ascribed  to  Jesus  himself  In  its  present  form,  at  any  rate,  it 
reflects  a  later  situation,  and  assumes  his  death.  Nor  is  it  quite 
easy  to  see  what  form  it  could  originally  have  had,  if  it  was  spoken 
by  Jesus.  It  has  been  suggested  {e.g.  by  Brandt)  that  the  parable 
originally  consisted  of  2-5,  9  only.  This  seems  doubtful.  The 
episode  of  the  son  seems  hardly  capable  of  being  so  completely 
cut  out.  The  parable  would  be  somewhat  poor  and  too  short 
without  it.  It  cannot,  with  whatever  prunings,  be  turned  into  a 
good  parable,  with  the  verisimilitude  of  the  more  genuine  parables. 
It  is  an  allegory,  as  Loisy  and  others  point  out,  from  start  to 
finish.  'It  gives  a  sort  of  "general"  philosophy  of  Israelite 
history,  in  so  far  as  that  history '  (from  the  writer's  point  of  view) 
'  has  its  culmination  in  the  ministry  and  death  of  Jesus  Christ.' 
Perhaps  it  belongs  to  the  same  stratum  in  the  redaction  of  the 
whole  Gospel  as  the  passages  in  which  Jesus  describes  the  details 
of  his  death  and  his  resurrection  {E.  S.  Ii.  p.  319).  It  is,  as  W. 
remarks,  curiously  different  from  the  cautious  replies  given  by 
him  in  xi.  27-33  ^^d  xii.  13-17.  Here  he  provokes  his  an- 
tagonists openly,  and  clearly  implies  that  he  is  the  Son  of 
God;  whereas,  in  the  most  authentic  passages  in  Mark,  he  never 
implies  that  in  a  special  and  unique  sense  he  is  God's  Son. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  argued  with  Dr  Carpenter  that 
his  caution  does  not  consist  in  a  concealment  of  the  Messianic 
claim  or  character,  to  which  the  entry  gave  the  utmost  publicity, 
but  in  avoiding  argumentative  traps.  '  The  Son  of  God '  may  be 
used  in  a  Messianic  rather  than  in  a  dogmatically  theological 
sense.     Menzies  says :    '  The  words  do  not  contain  an  explicit 


278  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  1-12 

declaration  of  the  divine  Sonship.'  No  one  has  more  clearly 
shown  than  Loisy  how  unnatural  or  even  absurd  the  parable  is  as 
a  parable.  The  incidents  will  not  work.  It  only  makes  sense  as 
a  transparent  allegory.  As  to  the  date,  he  says  that  the  whole 
has  rather  the  air  of  an  argument  of  the  first  Christians  against 
the  Jews  than  of  a  speech  of  Jesus  to  the  people  or  the  notables 
of  Jerusalem  {E.  S.  Ii.  p.  312).  'II  n'y  avait  pas  lieu,  avant 
r^v^nement,  de  montrer  dans  la  mort  de  Jesus  le  dernier  terme  de 
la  patience  divine'  (p.  319). 

I.  The  vineyard  parable  quotes  and  follows  Isaiah.  'Jesus 
was  not  wont  to  draw  from  the  O.T.  the  matter  of  his  stories' 
(Loisy).  The  vineyard  is,  in  one  sense,  Israel,  in  another,  the 
Kingdom.  Its  owner  is  God.  The  absence  of  the  owner,  de- 
manded by  the  development  of  the  allegory,  is  unsuited  to  God. 
The  husbandmen  are,  partly,  the  leaders,  priests.  Scribes  and 
Pharisees  as  representing  the  people  ;  partly,  the  people  them- 
selves.    The  parable  is  not  quite  consistent. 

2-5.  The  various  servants  represent  the  prophets  whose 
messages  Israel  refused  to  hear. 

6.  The  son  is  Jesus.  The  Kingdom  is  his.  Hence  he  may 
be  called  the  '  heir.'  It  is  amazing  that  Menzies  should  think  this 
clearly  '  party '  parable  is  '  a  telling  representation  of  the  fact  of 
the  decay  in  Jesus's  time  of  the  sense  of  the  nearness  and  reality 
of  God.'  There  is  no  adequate  evidence  that  God  was  not  as  near 
and  real  to  a  large  percentage  of  Jews  in  A.D.  30  as  there  is  over- 
whelming evidence  to  show  and  prove  that  He  was  near  and  real 
to  them  in  A.D.  300. 

9.  Who  are  '  the  others '  ?  This  is  not  clearly  indicated. 
Some  think  that  the  poor  and  the  outcast,  the  repentant  tax- 
collector  and  sinner,  are  intended.  More  probably,  as  in  Matthew, 
the  '  others '  are  the  Gentiles. 

10,  II.  Some  think  that  these  verses  are  an  addition,  and 
that  the  true  close  to  the  parable  is  9.  The  stone  is  Jesus.  '  This 
is  the  Lord's  doing,'  i.e.  the  stone  came  from  God.  Rejected 
by  the  Jewish  religious  authorities,  the  stone  has  become  the 
chief  stone  of  the  world's  spiritual  edifice.  Loisy  denies  that 
the  verses  are  an  addition.  The  allegory  is  not  complete 
without  it.  'Le  sort  ult^rieur  du  fils  importe  au  narrateur; 
mais  celui-ci  ne  pouvait  pas  dire  que  le  fils  ressusciterait  et  qu'il 
serait  glorifie  au  ciel,  sans  abandonner  la  fiction  de  la  vigne' 
{E.  S.  II.  p.  312). 


XII.  13-17]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  279 

12.  The  phrasing  of  the  verse  is  odd.  Loisy  thinks  that  the 
last  few  words,  '  so  they  left  him,  and  went  their  way,'  belong 
properly  to  xi.  33  and  should  be  followed  by  xii.  13.  'But  they 
feared  the  people '  is  an  attenuation  of  xiv.  2,  after  xi.  32.  The 
parable  of  the  vineyard  was  originally  placed  just  before  the  opening 
of  the  Passion,  and  xii.  12  is  a  sort  of  echo  or  repetition  of  xiv.  i,  2, 
which  may  be  supposed  to  have  run  something  like  this :  '  They 
realized  that  he  had  spoken  the  parable  against  them.  And  they 
sought  how  they  should  lay  hold  of  him  by  guile  to  put  him  to 
death.  For  they  said :  not  during  the  festival,  lest  there  should 
be  a  tumult  among  the  people.  Now  the  Passover  and  the  festival 
of  the  unleavened  bread  were  to  take  place  after  two  days '  {E.  S. 
II.  pp.  315-318). 


T3-17.    'Give  unto  C^.sar' 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxii.  15-22;  Luke  xx.  20-26) 

13  And  they  sent  unto  him  certain  of  the  Pharisees  and  of  the 

14  Herodians,  that  they  might  entrap  him  by  his  words.  And  when 
they  were  come,  they  said  unto  him,  '  Master,  we  know  that  thou 
art  truthful,  and  hast  regard  for  no  man :  for  thou  respectest  not 
the  person  of  men,  but  teachest  the  way  of  God  in  truth.     Is  it 

15  lawful  to  give  tribute  to  the  Emperor,  or  not  ?  Should  we  give 
it,  or  should  we  not  give  it  V  But  he,  perceiving  their  deceitful- 
ness,  said  unto  them,  '  Why  tempt  ye  me  ?  bring  me  a  silver  coin, 

16  that  I  may  see  it.'  And  they  brought  it.  And  he  said  unto  them, 
'  Whose  is  this  image  and  superscription  ? '     And  they  said  unto 

17  him,  '  The  Emperor's.'  And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  them, 
'  Pay  to  the  Emperor  what  is  the  Emperor's,  and  to  God  what  is 
God's.'     And  they  marvelled  at  him  greatly. 

13.  The  series  of  questions,  which  was  begun  by  the  priests 
in  xi.  27-33,  is  now,  after  the  interruption  of  xii.  1-12,  resumed 
and  continued  till  xii.  34. 

W.  remarks  that  it  is  odd  to  meet  the  'Herodians'  in  Jeru- 
salem ;  their  place  is  in  Galilee.  The  explanation  is  that  friends 
and  foes  of  Rome  are  to  unite  in  the  question,  so  that  Jesus 
may  be  endangered  whether  he  says  yes  or  no.  '  The  Herodians, 
upholders  of  the  native  monarchy,  were  averse  to  any  political 
disturbance,  which  might  complicate  the  relations  between  the 
Roman  government  and  that  monarchy,  and  could  not  desire  any 


28o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  13-17 

Messiah  to  succeed'  (Menzies).  Or  we  may  suppose  that  they 
desired  that  Judsea,  instead  of  being  governed  by  the  Romans, 
should  be  under  a  prince  of  their  own  family.  In  that  case  both 
the  questioners  would  be  supposed  to  be  hostile  to  Rome.  So 
Loisy  (E.  S.  il.  p.  333). 

14.  They  flatter  him  in  order  to  induce  him  to  give  a  direct 
answer. 

The  fiercer  party  among  the  Jewish  nationalists  held  that  it 
was  not  permissible  to  pay  tribute  to  Rome  (cp.  Josephus,  Ant. 
book  XVIII.  ch.  i.  i ;  Acts  v.  37).  If  Jesus  said  it  was  permissible, 
how  could  he  claim  to  be  the  Messiah  ?  Was  not  the  Messiah  to 
usher  in  the  era  of  national  independence  ?  If  he  said  it  was  not, 
there  would  be  trouble  for  him  with  the  authorities. 

15.  vTroKpiaiv,  'dissimulation.'  Jesus  recognizes  that  he  is 
not  being  asked  for  the  sake  of  getting  at  the  truth,  but  in  order 
to  trip  him  up.  They  '  tempt '  him  to  deny  the  authority  of  the 
Emperor  by  boldly  declaring  his  Messiahship. 

Jesus  has  no  money.  He  asks  for  a  silver  denaritis  (worth 
about  8^d.).  These  coins  were  not  made  in  Palestine.  The  copper 
coin  which  alone  was  made  there  bore  no  head  or  figure  on  it,  on 
account  of  Jewish  susceptibilities.  The  denarius  would  have  on 
it  the  head  of  the  deified  Augustus. 

17.  What  are  we  to  say  of  this  famous  answer?  It  implied 
that  there  was  a  field  in  which  the  Emperor  had  authority,  but 
that  religion,  without  interfering  with  the  legitimate  rights  of  the 
Emperor,  could  exist  in  its  fulness  notwithstanding.  The  rule  of 
Rome  need  not  interfere  with  the  practice  of  religion. 

It  is  very  important  to  notice  that  the  bulk  of  the  Pharisees 
took  much  the  same  line.  The  Scribes  and  legalists  at  all  events 
were  by  no  means  keen  to  raise  the  standard  of  revolt.  They 
expected  God  to  destroy  Rome  just  as  Jesus  did.  There  was 
no  great  difiierence  in  this  respect  between  them.  The  com- 
mentators ignore  this  agreement  or  deny  it.  It  is  inconvenient, 
perhaps,  but  the  evidence  seems  to  show  that  it  is  true.  The 
importance  of  the  saying  is  diminished  when  we  remember  that 
Jesus,  in  any  case,  believed  that  the  rule  of  Rome  was  only  going 
to  last  quite  a  short  time.  For  either  before  his  death,  or  after  it 
and  at  his  reappearance,  would  come  the  new  age  and  the 
perfected  Kingdom,  and  then  the  Roman  dominion  would  dis- 
appear. The  rule  of  Rome  was  to  disappear  by  God's  agency,  not 
by  man's.  Not  by  revolt  and  force  of  arms,  but  when  the  Son  of 
man  comes  down  from  heaven  will  the  heathen  domination  cease. 


XII.  I3-I71        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MABK  281 

'Der  Weg  Gottes,'  as  J,  Weiss  well  says,  'geht  von  oben  nach 
unten.'  That  was  just  what  the  great  majority  of  the  Rabbis 
held. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  answer  was  primarily  intended  to  be 
non-committal.  It  maintains  the  policy  of  caution.  Once  more 
Jesus  cleverly  avoids  a  dilemma.  W.  holds  that  no  more  was 
intended,  though  a  denial  of  the  theocracy  may  be  found  as  the 
implication  of  his  reply.  He  sets  up  no  principle  by  which  one 
can  clearly  sever  the  claims  of  God  and  the  claims  of  the  Emperor. 
He  only  asserts  that  each  has  his  rights  and  claims,  which  we  may 
legitimately  satisfy.  We  cannot  use  his  answer  as  a  solution  of 
any  of  our  own  difficulties,  except  in  so  far  as  it  may  seem  to  assert 
that  state  and  religion  are  two  separate  and  not  connected  terri- 
tories. And  W.  seems  to  me  right  when  he  calls  Ranke's  opinion 
that  our  passage  is  the  most  important  and  far-reaching  of  the 
words  of  Jesus, '  etwas  profan  und  recht  verkehrt.' 

Loisy's  remarks  upon  the  passage  seem  to  me  very  judicious 
and  sensible.  Jesus  means,  he  says,  that '  civil  obedience,  attested 
by  the  payment  of  the  tribute,  no  more  contradicts  than  it  abolishes 
the  obedience  which  is  due  to  God.  The  first  of  these  duties  does 
not  interfere  with  the  second.  The  first  is  trivial  in  comparison 
with  the  second.  Let  men  observe  it  without  attaching  greater 
importance  to  it  than  it  possesses,  and  let  them  give  their  minds 
above  everything  to  the  essential  duty,  which  is  moral  and  religious 
duty.  Jesus  emphasises  the  lawfulness  of  political  power  and  of 
tribute  much  less  than  the  insignificance  of  these  things  in  com- 
parison with  the  Kingdom  of  heaven.  It  is  implied  that  the 
Kingdom  of  heaven  is  not  to  be  established  by  violence,  by  a 
rebellion  against  the  established  order ;  in  the  interval  before  its 
coming,  one  should  pay  to  Caesar  the  tax  which  attests  his 
sovereignty,  and  it  would  be  foolish  to  believe  that  God  and  his 
reign  would  gain  anything  by  the  rejection  of  an  obligation  of  this 
kind.  Let  the  things  of  this  world  be  esteemed  according  to  the 
smallness  of  their  value,  and  let  these  duties  be  discharged 
according  as  there  is  necessity ;  but  let  men  know  above  all  that 
the  greatest  thing  lies  elsewhere,  in  fidelity  to  the  heavenly  Father. 
It  would  be  to  falsify  the  thought  of  Jesus  to  suppose  that  the 
debt  to  Caesar  is  on  the  same  plane,  or  that  it  has  the  same 
absolute  and  definite  character  as  the  duty  towards  God.  Nothing 
was  farther  from  his  thoughts  than  to  establish  a  principle  in 
accordance  with  which  the  boundaries  of  the  domains  of  God  and 
those  of  Caesar  might  be  rigidly  defined'  {E.  S.  Ii.  p.  336). 

See  also  Additional  Note  22. 


282  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS    [John  VII.  S3-VIII.  1 1 

The  Woman  taken  in  Adultery 
(John  vii.  53 — viii.  Ii) 

S3,  I        And  they  went,  each  one,  to  his  own  house.     And  Jesus  went 

2  to  the  Mount  of  Olives.  And  early  in  the  morning,  he  returned 
to  the  temple,  and  all  the  people  came  unto  him,  and  he  sat  down, 

3  and  he  taught  them.  And  the  scribes  and  Pharisees  brought 
unto  him  a  woman  taken  in  adultery,  and  putting  her  in  the 

4  midst  of  them,  they  said  to  him,  '  Master,  this  woman  was  taken 

5  in  the  very  act  of  adultery.  Now  Moses  commanded  us  in  the 
Law  that  such  women  should  be  stoned ;  what  then  sayest  thou?' 

6  And  they  said  this  to  try  bim,  that  they  might  have  something 
with  which  to  accuse  him.     But  Jesus  stooped  forward  and  wrote 

7  with  his  finger  upon  the  ground.  But  when  they  continued 
asking  him,  he  raised  his  head,  and  said  unto  them,  '  He  that  is 
Avithout  sin  amongst  you,  let  him  be  the  first  to  cast  a  stone  at 

8  her.'    And  again  he  stooped  forward,  and  wrote  upon  the  ground. 

9  And  they,  having  heard  that,  withdrew  one  by  one,  beginning  with 
the  eldest ;  and  Jesus  was  left  alone,  and  the  woman,  where  she 

10  was,  in  the  midst.    And  Jesus  lifted  his  head,  and  said  to  her: 

11  '  Woman,  where  are  they?  Has  no  one  condemned  thee?'  And 
she  said,  '  No  one,  Lord.'  Then  Jesus  said,  'Neither  do  I  condemn 
thee.     Go,  and  from  henceforth  sin  no  more.' 

According  to  many  critics  it  is  most  probable  that  in  the  oldest 
story  of  the  life  of  Jesus  in  Jerusalem  there  followed  between  the 
'Give  unto  Csesar'  incident,  and  the  question  of  the  Sadducees, 
the  tale  of  the  woman  taken  in  adultery.  Why  this  tale  dropped 
out  of  the  Synoptics,  and  why  it  found  an  incongruous  and  un- 
satisfactory home  in  some  MSS.  of  the  fourth  Gospel  are  questions 
upon  which  I  need  not  enter  here.  W.  regards  the  story  as 
certainly  apocryphal  {Einleitwig,  p.  70).  Loisy  says  '  it  is  morally 
certain  that  the  story  is  an  authentic  part  of  the  most  authentic 
parts  of  the  Gospel '  (ie  quatrieme  Evangile,  p.  542  at  top).  Thus 
do  the  great  authorities  diifer !  The  internal  difficulties  of  the 
story  are  very  great,  and  these  difficulties  make  me  incline  some- 
what towards  the  opinion  of  W.  But  if  it  is  not  true,  it  is  at  least 
ben  trovato,  and  quite  in  keeping  with  some  of  the  moral  state- 
ments, paradoxical,  searching,  strange  and  exalted,  but  elusive,  of 
the  historical  Jesus.    In  any  case  it  may  usefully  be  included  here. 


JohnVILs3-VIII.  II]    THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK       283 

2.  Thus  this  story,  if  authentic  and  put  in  its  right  place, 
makes  and  marks  a  fresh  day  in  the  Jerusalem  ministry. 

3.  How  and  why  was  the  woman  taken  and  brought  before 
Jesus  ?  Did  her  accomplice  escape  ?  Did  the  '  Scribes  and 
Pharisees '  seize  her  in  order  to  bring  her  to  justice — to  a  court — 
and  was  the  Temple  near  where  she  was  seized,  and  did  the  idea 
strike  these  Scribes  and  Pharisees  to  see  if  they  could  use  this 
woman  as  a  snare  for  the  Galilsean  teacher?  And  why  should 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  have  been  present  and  in  such  convenient 
numbers?  All  these  quite  unanswerable  questions  give  rise  to 
the  gravest  suspicion. 

Again  it  is  a  very  dubious  matter  whether  adultery  was,  or 
could  be,  at  that  time,  punishable  with  death.  Many  great 
scholars  think  that  it  was  not. 

5.  Another  difficulty.  The  law  does  not  say  that  adulteresses 
are  to  be  stoned  except  in  the  special  case  mentioned  in  Deut. 
xxii.  23.  Was  this  woman  betrothed  ?  If  not,  the  Rabbinic  law 
arranged  that  when  the  Pentateuchal  ordinance  fixed  no  particular 
kind  of  death,  the  guilty  person  should  be  strangled. 

6.  What  was  the  '  temptation '  or  '  test '  ?  Probably  this. 
Jesus  was  supposed  to  be  merciful  to  sinners,  perhaps  especially 
to  women.  If,  then,  his  opinion  were  asked,  and  he  were  tempted 
to  urge  that  this  woman,  if  she  repented,  should  be  forgiven,  then 
he  could  be  brought  into  conflict  with  the  letter  of  the  God-given 
Law. 

Jesus  guesses  what  they  would  be  at.  Perhaps  he  is  morally 
wroth  that  this  woman  in  her  shame  should  be  used  for  such  a 
purpose.  He  refuses  to  look  upon  them  or  upon  her ;  he  will  not 
add  to  her  shame.  At  any  rate,  be  her  guilt  what  it  may,  it  does 
not  concern  him;  it  is  not  for  him  to  decide  and  condemn  her. 
He  therefore  abstractedly  makes  marks  in  the  dust  on  the  floor. 
So  one  may  interpret  his  action.  One  need  not  ask  :  What  did  he 
write  ? 

7.  Forced  to  reply,  Jesus  once  more  raises  another  issue. 
He  neither  condemns  nor  acquits.  What  does  he  mean  ?  It  is 
easy  to  admire  and  to  vaguely  paraphrase  his  words ;  it  is  less  easy 
to  understand  them.  It  would  be  ludicrous  that  no  one  should 
judge  criminal  cases  who  was  not  himself '  sinless,'  conscious  of  no 
sin.  In  that  case  there  would  be  no  judges  or  juries  in  the  world. 
The  words  of  Jesus  are  relative  to  his  questioners.    Do  they  imply : 

(i)  It  is  not  for  anyone  except  the  regularly  constituted 
tribunal  to  condemn  this  woman.  It  is  not  for  you,  therefore, 
or  for  me,  to  condemn  her. 


284  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS     [John  VII.  53-VIII.  1 1 

(2)  'Judge  not.'  You  seem  glad  to  condemn.  But 
should  one  not  be  sorry  and  reluctant  1  Perhaps  too  :  was  it 
for  you  to  seize  her  ?  Are  you  guilty  of  no  sins,  whether  sins 
of  the  flesh  or  others,  for  which  you  should  not  be  seized  ? 

(3)  Should  this  woman's  shame  be  used  as  a  means  with 
which  to  entrap  me? 

(4)  Is  it  conceivable  that  the  very  absence  and  escape  of 
the  probably  greater  culprit  makes  Jesus  the  more  scrupulous 
about  condemning  the  woman  ?  Is  not  society  always  readier 
to  punish  the  woman  than  the  man  ?  Was  not  Jesus  the 
champion  of  womanhood  ? 

The  words  make  a  deep  impression  upon  us  even  though  we 
cannot  be  wholly  certain  as  to  the  precise  meanings  they  are 
intended  to  convey. 

9.  It  seems  doubtful  whether  this  dramatic  retirement  is 
historically  likely.  The  gloss  of  some  MSS.  '  convicted  by  their 
own  conscience  '  is  what  is  intended.  Loisy  says :  '  lis  s'en  vont 
assez  confus,  mais  non  contrits.'  Loisy  would  here  know  too  much, 
a  fault  he  is  not  slow  to  blame  in  others.  Again  '  beginning  with 
the  eldest,'  to  which  some  MSS.  add  '  even  unto  the  last,'  is  very 
obscure  and  doubtful.  It  i-aises  suspicion.  It  was  no  regular 
court :  why  then  should  the  eldest  have  been  the  first  to  sneak  off? 
The  narrator  thinks  of  a  court  with  a  regular  order  and  precedence. 
He  falls  out  of  his  narrative,  and  thus  casts  doubt  upon  the  whole. 

II.  The  final  scene  between  Jesus  and  the  woman  is  im- 
pressive in  its  brief  simplicity.  His  words,  as  Loisy  well  says,  are 
a  harmonious  union  of  dignity  and  goodness.  His  point  of  view, 
says  Holtzmann,  is  that  of  Ezekiel  xxxiii.  11.  'Repent  and  live.' 
He  was  sent  to  call  sinners  to  repentance  and  to  save  them.  He 
is  no  judge  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word.  '  L'application 
juridique  de  la  Loi  ne  le  regarde  pas ;  mais  I'ame  de  la  pecheresse 
et  son  salut  ne  peuvent  lui  §tre  indiff^rents.  S'il  s'interdit  de  la 
faire  mettre  a  mort,  c'est  pour  I'engager  k  bien  vivre,  s'il  ne 
condamne  pas  la  coupable,  il  ne  laisse  pas  de  condamner  le  pech^ ' 
(Le  quatrieme  £Jvangile,  p.  549). 


18-27.     The  Life  of  the  Resurkection 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxii.  23-33  I  Luke  xx.  27-38) 

18  Then  came  unto  him  some  Sadducees,  who  say  there  is  no 

19  resurrection ;  and  they  asked  him,  saying,  '  Master,  Moses  wrote 


I       XII.  18-27]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  285 

for  us,  If  a  man  die,  and  leave  a  wife  and  no  child,  his  brother 

20  must  marry  his  wife,  and  raise  up  seed  unto  his  brother.  Now 
there  were  seven  brothers:  and  the  first  took  a  wife,  and  dying 

21  left  no  seed.    And  the  second  married  her,  and  died  without  leaving 

22  seed :  and  the  third  likewise.     And  all  seven  left  no  seed :  last 

23  of  all  the  woman  died  also.  In  the  resurrection,  therefore,  when 
they  rise,  whose  wife  will  she  be  of  them  ?  for  all  the  seven  had 
her  to  wife.' 

24  And  Jesus  answering  said  unto  them,  'Does  not  this  prove 
that  ye  err,  and  that  ye  neither  know  the  scriptures  nor  the 

25  power  of  God  ?  For  when  they  rise  from  the  dead,  they  neither 
marry  nor  are  given  in  marriage ;  but  are  as  the  angels  in  heaven. 

26  But  as  regards  the  dead,  that  they  rise :  have  ye  not  read  in  the 
book  of  Moses,  in  the  story  of  the  burning  bush,  how  God  spoke 
unto  him,  saying,  I  am  the  God  of  Abraham,  and  the  God  of  Isaac, 

27  and  the  God  of  Jacob  ?  He  is  not  the  God  of  the  dead,  but  the 
God  of  the  living :  ye  do  greatly  err.' 

18.  After  the  Pharisees  have  had  their  'test'  comes  the  turn 
of  the  Sadducees.  Their  question  is  put  in  order  to  show  that, 
whatever  answer  be  given,  the  theory  of  resurrection  leads  to 
absurdity.  If  Moses  ordered  the  so-called  Levirate  marriage 
(Deut.  XXV.  S)  he  cannot  have  believed  in  the  resurrection. 

Jesus  shows  that  no  absurdity  is  involved.  The  conditions  of 
the  resurrection  life  are  unlike  those  of  the  present  life.  There 
is  no  marrying  or  giving  in  marriage. 

Though  the  popular  view  may  have  been  that  the  ordinary  life 
on  earth,  interrupted  by  death,  would  be  resumed  at  the  resur- 
rection, this  was  not  the  official  doctrine  of  the  Rabbis.  The  locus 
classicus  on  the  subject  is  Berachoth  17a,  and  runs  thus: — 'Rab 
used  to  say :  In  the  world  to  come  there  is  no  eating  or  drinking 
or  marrying  or  envy  or  hate ;  but  the  pious  rest  with  crowns  upon 
their  heads,  and  are  satisfied  with  the  glory  of  God.' 

This  was  the  official  doctrine,  and  it  doubtless  was  already  the 
view  of  all  educated  Pharisees  at  the  time  of  Christ.  But  see  also 
Additional  Note  23. 

19.  Cp.  Deut.  XX.  S-io  and  Genesis  xxxviii.  8.  W.  thinks 
that  this  kind  of  marriage  was  no  longer  practised  at  the  time  of 
Christ. 

24.     ov  Bi,a  TovTO.     'Yoar  very  question,  with  the  dilemma 


286  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  18-27 

you  suppose  involved,  and  your  consequent  detiial  of  the  resur- 
rection, show  the  measure  of  your  error.  They  show  that  you 
know  neither  the  Scriptures  (which  prove  the  resurrection)  nor 
the  power  of  God  (who  makes  the  resurrection  life  to  differ  from, 
and  be  higher  than,  the  life  on  earth).'  The  second  point  is  taken 
in  25  ;  the  first  point  in  26.  There  is  a  certain  parallelism  of 
words  and  phrase  with  I  Cor.  xv.  33,  34  dealing  with  the  same 
subject. 

26.  The  proof  of  the  resurrection  is  of  the  usual  fanciful  kind 
when  proofs  from  Scripture  are  attempted.  As  God  is  (as  all 
admit)  the  God  of  the  living  and  not  of  the  dead,  and  as  He  calls 
Himself  to  Moses  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob  (who  had 
died  long  ago),  these  patriarchs  must  still  live ;  and  this,  again, 
can  only  mean  that  they  will '  rise '  or  have  '  risen.'  Is  it  assumed 
that  they  are  now  in  '  heaven '  ?  Or  are  they  only  potentially 
alive,  while,  at  the  resurrection,  they  will  live  fully  once  more  ? 
'  The  inference  seems  to  be  that  when  the  words  were  spoken  the 
patriarchs  were  still  living,  and  that  their  resurrection  was  a  natural 
and  probable  corollary '  (Allen),  The  idea  apparently  is  that  the 
dead  are  waiting  for  the  resurrection,  not  asleep,  but  with  full 
consciousness,  whether  of  pleasure  or  pain.  But  only  the  righteous 
dead  are  thought  of,  or  referred  to,  in  this  passage.  Yet  Schmidt 
is  scarcely  justified  in  saying  that  Jesus's  answer  shows  that '  he 
did  not  hold  the  common  Pharisaic  view.  He  believed  that 
those  who  were  accounted  worthy  of  a  resurrection  were  raised 
immediately  after  death '  {Prophet  of  Nazareth,  p.  283). 


28-34.    The  Greatest  Commandment 
{Cp.  Matthew  xxii.  34-40;  Luke  xx.  39,  40,  x.  25-28) 

38        Then  one  of  the  scribes  who  had  heard  them  disputing  together, 
and  had  perceived  that  Jesus  had  answered  them  excellently,  came 

29  up  and  asked  him,  'Which  commandment  is  the  first  of  all?'    And 
Jesus  answered  him, '  The  first  of  all  the  commandments  is.  Hear, 

30  O  Israel,  the  Lord  our  God  the  Lord  is  One :  and  thou  shalt  love 
the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy  heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and 

31  with  all  thy  mind,  and  with  all  thy  strength.     And  the  second  is 
this.  Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself.     There  is  no  other 

32  commandment  greater  than  these.'    And  the  scribe  said  unto  him, 
'Excellently,  Master,  thou  hast  said  the  truth,  that  He  is  One,  and 

33  there  is  none  other  but  He :  and  to  love  Him  with  all  one's  heart, 


XII.  28-34]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  287 

and  with  all  one's  understanding,  and  with  all  one's  strength,  and 
to  love  one's  neighbour  as  oneself,  is  much  better  than  all  burnt 
34  offerings  and  sacrifices.'  And  when  Jesus  saw  that  he  answered 
intelligently,  he  said  unto  him,  'Thou  art  not  far  from  the  kingdom 
of  God.' 

Both  B.  Weiss  and  Loisy  suppose  that  the  story  of  the  greatest 
commandment  is  taken  from  Q,  but  from  very  different  reasons. 
Those  which  Weiss  puts  forward  do  not  seem  to  me  very  probable. 
Somewhat  more  likely  are  those  of  Loisy.  He  notices  that  in 
Luke  it  is  the  Scribe  and  not  Jesus  who  gives  the  answer,  and 
declares  which  commandments  are  the  greatest.  In  Mark  the 
Scribe  is  made  as  it  were  to  repeat  the  answer  which  Jesus  has 
already  given  him.  'Nothing  more  awkward  (froid)  than  this 
repetition.'  May  we  not  conjecture  that  Mark  used  a  source  where 
the  Scribe  gave  the  answer,  as  he  now  does  in  Luke,  and  that  this 
answer  was  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  order  to  do  him  honour, 
and  to  permit  of  its  being  classed  among  the  victorious  replies  of  his 
ministry  at  Jerusalem  ?  (In  the  source  there  may  have  been  no 
place  or  date  attached  to  the  tale.)  M.  Loisy  rather  shyly  ventures 
to  suggest  that  the  combination  of  Deut.  vi.  4  and  Leviticus 
xix.  1 8  was  not  beyond  the  power  of  a  Rabbi.  And  after  all  it  is 
in  the  parable  of  the  Samaritan  and  not  in  the  quotation  from  the 
Law  that  the  true  doctrine  of  Jesus  about  charity  is  contained ! 
Moreover,  would  Luke  have  ventured  to  ascribe  so  excellent  a 
reply  to  a  Pharisee  if  the  source  had  attributed  it  to  Jesus  ? 
(E.  8.  II.  pp.  347-352.)    J.  Weiss's  view  is  quite  similar. 

It  is  pleasant  to  come  once  more  upon  a  passage  of  value  for  us 
to-day,  which  we  have  not  had  since  x.  44.  One  more  question  is 
put  to  Jesus.  He  has  triumphantly  answered  priest,  Pharisees, 
and  Sadducees.  Now  an  individual  Rabbi  comes  upon  the  scene. 
His  question,  however,  is  not  asked  in  any  hostile  spirit,  nor  with 
insidious  intent.  Therefore  it  is  frankly  answered.  This  paragraph 
shows  us  Jesus  as  the  true  successor  of  Amos  and  Isaiah ;  he 
speaks  as  they  would  have  spoken.  And  here,  too,  Mark  allows 
us  to  see  for  once  that  there  were  good  men  even  outside  the 
followers  of  Jesus  and  among  the  Pharisees.  But  such  a  con- 
cession is  somewhat  too  arduous  for  Matthew.  As  W.  says, 
Matthew  cannot  abide  '  dass  Jesus  sich  mit  dem  Rabbi  auf  dem 
Boden  des  edelsten  Judentums  zusammenfindet.' 

29.  The  reply  of  Jesus  is  very  significant.  Like  the  good 
Jew  he  is,  he  at  once  quotes  the  Shema  as  the  first  and  highest 
commandment.  The  love  of  the  One  God  is  the  supreme  ordinance. 
Next  to  it  he  places  Leviticus  xix.  18.     The  bringing  together  of 


288  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  28-34 

these  two  commandments  is  highly  striking  and  suggestive.  They 
are  to  this  day  the  main  part,  though  not  the  complete  whole,  of 
the  Jewish  religion. 

W.'s  note  is  excellent.  'Jesus  answers  with  two  sayings  of 
the  Law,  which  the  Rabbi  also  acknowledges  to  be  its  flower  and 
kernel.  Only  here  does  Jesus  (using  the  words  of  the  Old 
Testament)  speak  of  the  love  of  God  and  of  one's  neighbour; 
usually  he  does  not  give  verbal  utterance  to  them.  Monotheism 
is  no  theory ;  it  is  a  practical  conviction;  it  is  the  spring  of  inward 
character  and  the  motive  of  our  conduct  to  our  neighbour.  It  is, 
in  other  words,  the  motive  of  morality ;  and  morality,  according 
to  the  right  supplement  of  the  Scribe,  belongs  to  the  service  of 
God  and  is  the  right  worship  of  Him  ;  it  is  of  more  value  than  all 
sacred  actions  which  are  specially  rendered  to  God  and  are  of  no 
use  to  anyone  else.  The  combination  of  the  two  sayings,  which  in 
the  Law  occur  in  different  places,  is  very  important  for  the  under- 
standing of  the  whole  passage ;  the  combination  was  first  effected 
in  this  way  by  Jesus.'     But  see  also  Additional  Note  24. 

32.  Has  the  Rabbi  heard  rumours  that  Jesus  arrogates  to 
himself  some  vague  sort  of  quasi  divinity,  and  is  he,  therefore, 
delighted  with  his  frank  confession  of  pure,  unadulterated  mono- 
theism ?  It  looks  almost  as  much,  for  the  Rabbi  proceeds  to 
emphasise  the  doctrine  of  the  One  God  with  renewed  intensity. 
The  verse  is  spoken  to  the  heart  of  every  Jew.  It  contains  the 
essence  of  Liberal  Judaism  in  a  nutshell. 

33.  The  conclusion  of  the  verse  recalls  Hosea  vi.  6  and  the 
many  similar  prophetic  passages. 

34.  W.  says : '  Thus  one  can  be,  already  on  earth,  in  the  Kingdom, 
or  near  it,  or  far  from  it.  The  conception  is  less  markedly  eschato- 
logical  here  than  in  x.  17-31.  Nor  does  Jesus  say  to  the  Rabbi, 
"  Abandon  everything,  and  follow  me."  The  love  of  God  and  one's 
neighbour  is  not  the  same  as  the  renunciation  of  the  world.  The 
decalogue  may  indeed  be  excelled  (x.  21),  but  the  monotheistic 
faith,  as  represented  in  the  combination  of  Deut.  vi.  4,  5  with 
Leviticus  xix.  18,  cannot  be  excelled,  not  even  by  discipleship  ajid 
martyrdom.' 

But  the  words  '  Thou  art  not  far  from  the  Kingdom  of  God,' 
which  seem  at  first  sight  simple,  contain  several  problems  and 
difficulties.  First  of  all  do  they  imply  that  the  Kingdom  is 
present  ?  If  so,  this  is  already  a  difficulty  in  Mark,  at  least  for 
those  who  share  the  views  of  W.,  of  J.  Weiss,  and  of  Wrede  upon 
this  vexed  question.  There  is  also  a  difficulty  in  supposing  that 
these  very  words  were  spoken  by  Jesus  himself.     For  W.  at  least 


XII.  28-34]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  289 

holds  that  the  Kingdom  as  present  is  later  than  Jesus.  It  is  his 
creation  and  he  is  its  '  correlative '  (Einleitung,  p.  105).  He  founds 
it  as  the  Messiah.  The  Kingdom  as  present  is  practically  the 
Christian  community,  the  Ecclesia.  It  is  composed  of  those  who 
believe  in  the  Messiahship  of  its  founder.  '  From  the  Kingdom 
as  present  Jesus,  as  the  Messiah  who  is  already  present,  is  in- 
separable (lb.  p.  106).  Therefore  he  himself  cannot  have  spoken  of  it. 
Now  the  words, '  Thou  art  not  far  from  the  Kingdom,'  would  seem 
almost  necessarily  to  imply  that  the  Kingdom  is  present.  It  can 
hardly  mean  '  You  will  nearly  enter  the  Kingdom,  though  not 
quite.'  They  must  rather  mean,  '  You  are  at  present  very  near 
something  which  already  exists.'  Here,  then,  we  must  admit  is 
one  of  the  very  rare  instances  in  which  in  Mark  the  Kingdom  is 
spoken  of  as  something  which  already  exists.  But  there  is  another 
difficulty  about  the  words.  We  may  say  that  their  meaning  is 
such  that  we  should  be  glad  to  doubt  the  correctness  of  their 
attribution  to  Jesus.  For  W.  may,  perhaps,  be  right  in  pointing 
out  {Einleitung,  p.  104)  that  what  is  implied  is  that  morality  is 
not  enough  to  secure  the  entry  into  the  Kingdom.  'He  who 
knows  that  the  love  of  God  and  one's  neighbour  is  the  sum  of 
the  Law  is,  however,  only  not  far  from  the  Kingdom  of  God,  and 
he  who  has  kept  all  the  commandments  from  his  youth  up,  still 
lacks  the  chief  thing,  and  even  John  the  Baptist  lacks  it.  [The 
reference  is  to  Mark  x.  21  and  Matt.  xi.  11.]  And  this  chief 
thing  is  the  acknowledgment  of  Jesus,  the  imitation  of  him,  and 
the  adhesion  to  his  body  of  disciples — an  adhesion  which  is  not 
bound  up  with  his  life,  but  starts  most  effectively  with  his 
death.'  [Thus  W.  modifies  what  he  had  said  in  his  note  upon 
the  verse  (in  the  commentary),  quoted  above.  His  words  there 
would  fit  rather  the  ungrudging  and  unqualified  reply  of  Jesus  in 
Luke :  '  Thou  hast  answered  right :  this  do  and  thou  shalt  live.'] 
If  what  W.  says  in  his  introduction  be  accurate,  we  have  here, 
half  concealed  under  a  pretty  phrase,  an  intense  particularism. 
It  heralds  eoetra  ecdesiam  nulla  salus.  No  particularism  can  be 
more  undesirable  than  that  which  asserts  that  morality  is  not  the 
adequate  condition  for  entry  into  the  Kingdom  of  God,  or  into 
'heaven.'  The  particularism  based  upon  right  belief  (characteristic 
of  Christianity)  seems  to  me  more  objectionable  than  the  par- 
ticularism of  descent  (characteristic  of  Judaism).  The  old  Jews 
said  frankly :  The  heathen  in  the  lump  are  bad.  This  was  narrow 
enough,  but  at  all  events  there  was  a  certain  naive  and  healthy 
narrowness  about  it.  It  still  preserves  the  supremacy  of  morality, 
and  renders  it  possible  for  a  Rabbi  to  urge  that  the  righteous  of 
every  nation  shall  be  '  saved.'  But  if  morality  is  not  the  test  for 
heaven — can  there  be  a  worse  particularism  than  this  ?     Be  as 

M.  19 


290  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  28-34 

good  as  you  please,  and  yet  you  shall  not  enter  in  unless  you 
believe  that  Jesus  is  the  Messiah,  or  some  other  dogma  quite 
outside  morality — this  is  surely  a  particularism  more  immoral  and 
more  dangerous  than  any  foolish  pride  of  race.  Let  us  hope  that 
Jesus  was  free  from  it. 


35-37.    Whose  Son  is  the  Messiah  ? 
{Gp.  Matt.  xxii.  41-46;  Luke  xx.  41-44) 

35  And  no  man  ventured  to  ask  him  any  more  questions.  And 
Jesus  went  on  teaching  in  the  temple,  and  said :  '  How  can  the 

36  scribes  say  that  the  Messiah  is  the  son  of  David?  For  David 
himself  said  in  the  Holy  Spirit,  The  Lord  said  to  my  lord.  Sit  thou 

37  on  my  right  hand,  till  I  make  thine  enemies  thy  footstool.  David 
himself  calleth  him  lord;  how  is  he  then  his  son?'  And  the 
mass  of  the  people  heard  him  gladly. 

M.  Loisy  rightly  says  that  the  words  'no  man  ventured  to 
ask  him  any  more  questions  '  come  awkwardly  here.  They  would 
find  a  better  place  after  xii.  27,  or  perhaps  they  stood  originally  at 
the  close  of  the  section  about  the  woman  taken  in  adultery, 
which  may  have  stood  in  the  narrative  source  of  Mark  in  the 
place  where  the  '  greatest  commandment '  stands  now. 

The  meaning  of  this  paragraph  seems  clear,  but  the  more  clear 
the  meaning,  the  stranger  does  it  seem.  Jesus  certainly  seems  to 
say  :  How  can  it  be  asserted  that  the  Messiah  is  the  son  of  David, 
if  David  regards  himself  as  inferior  to  the  Messiah  ?  A  father 
would  not  call  his  son  '  lord,'  but  David  calls  the  Messiah  '  lord.' 
(Jesus  shares  the  ordinary  belief  of  his  time  as  to  the  authorship 
of  the  '  Davidic '  psalms.)  Apparently  this  must  imply  that  Jesus 
claims  to  be  the  Messiah,  though  he  be  not  the  descendant  of 
David.  (The  genealogies  in  Matthew  were  made  up  later  to  prove 
that  he  was.)  Jesus  seems  not  to  wish  to  be  regarded  as  the 
'son  of  David.'  This  is  extraordinary.  For  how  could  he  be 
the  Messiah  if  he  was  not  the  Messiah  of  prophecy  ?  If  the  Old 
Testament  was  wrong,  and  the  prophets  spoke  falsely,  why  did 
Jesus  not  say  so  ?  Why  did  he  not  say,  '  There  will  be  no  Davidic 
Messiah,  but  I  am  something  far  higher  than  the  mere  Davidic 
Messiah  of  the  prophets '  ?  The  puzzle  is  that  Jesus  wants  both 
to  refute  and  to  fulfil  the  Old  Testament  and  its  prophecies.  He 
is  the  predicted  Messiah  ;  and  he  is  not  the  predicted  Messiah. 
One  asks  in  vain:  (i)  Did  he  really  take  up  this  illogical  position? 


XII.  35-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDING  TO  MARK  291 

(2)  Was  he  conscious  of  the  illogicalness  ?  I  hardly  think  that  to 
say  that  Jesus  thought  he  was  the  servant-Messiah  of  Isaiah 
xlii.  and  liii.  but  not  the  Messiah  of  Isaiah  xi.  is  an  adequate 
answer.  Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  the  explanation  is  that  the 
'Old  Testament  does  not  speak  with  one  voice.  The  Gospel 
■writers  were  no  more  historical  critics  than  Jesus  himself.  If 
they  and  he  fastened  on  the  servant  passages  (Messianically  in- 
terpreted), the  only  way  open  to  them  was  to  ignore  the  Davidic 
king  passages.'  But  the  difficulty  of  this  seems  to  me  to  be  that 
Jesus  does  not  here  merely  ignore.  He  goes  out  of  his  way  to 
attack.  He  combats  the  doctrine  which  the  'Davidic  king 
passages'  emphatically  teach. 

Jesus,  on  the  other  hand,  J.  Weiss  supposes,  had  a  higher, 
more  apocalyptic  conception  of  the  Messiah.  He  was  a  heavenly 
being  who  would  descend  from  heaven  upon  the  clouds.  If  he  be 
the  Messiah,  or  rather  if  he  is  to  become  the  Messiah,  a  miracle 
from  God  must  raise  him  upon  his  divine  throne.  He  does  not 
want  to  be  a  son  of  David  who  through  his  legitimate  descent 
shall  become  an  earthly  king.  Only  a  divine  miracle  can  make 
Jesus  the  true  heavenly  Messiah  that  is  to  be.  Weiss  apparently 
means  to  imply  that  the  Messiah,  as  a  heavenly  being,  is  not  of 
human  descent.  Schweitzer,  who  shares  the  views  of  Weiss  as  to 
the  character  of  the  Messianic  consciousness  of  Jesus,  has  a  very 
interesting  view  of  the  present  section.  He  says :  '  There  is  no 
question  of  a  denial  of  the  Davidic  descent  of  the  Messiah.  Jesus, 
as  in  the  entry,  is  playing  with  his  secret.  He  asks.  How  can  the 
Messiah  be  under  David,  according  to  his  descent,  as  his  son,  and 
yet,  in  the  Psalm,  be  called  by  David  David's  "  lord  "  ?  The  real 
answer  is :  through  his  transformation  and  Parousia,  when  natural 
relationships  will  be  annulled,  and  the  scion  of  David,  who  is  the 
predestined  "Son  of  man,"  will  assume  possession  of  his  rule. 
Hence,  far  from  denying  Davidic  descent  in  this  passage,  Jesus 
assumes  it.  And  this  makes  one  wonder  whether  he  did  not 
really  already  in  his  lifetime  look  upon  himself  as  a  descendant 
of  David  and  whether  he  was  not  regarded  as  such.  Paul,  who 
■otherwise  does  not  show  any  interest  in  the  earthly  phase  of  the 
Lord's  existence,  yet  nevertheless  certainly  assumes  the  descent 
from  David'  {Von  Reimarus  zu  Wrede,  p.  392).  Schweitzer  is 
fantastic,  and  I  fear  his  argumentation  is  not  very  sound,  but  his 
■view  on  this  section  would  undoubtedly  avoid  a  real  difficulty. 

Failing  a  better  explanation,  we  must  suppose  that  the  interest 
of  Jesus  in  the  question  which  he  raised  was  caused  on  the  one 
hand  by  the  conviction  that  he  was  the  Messiah,  and  on  the 
other  by  his  knowledge  that  he  was  not  descended  from  David. 
The  common  belief  that  the  Messiah  must  be  a  scion  of  David's 

19 — 2 


292  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  35-37 

house  stood  seriously  in  the  way  of  his  own  recognition  as  Messiah. 
In  any  case  the  story  seems  to  show  the  inadequacy  of  the  idea 
that  he  covsciously  wanted  to  be  quite  a  different  sort  of  Messiah 
from  the  ordinary  'political'  Messiah  expected  by  the  populace 
and  the  Rabbis.  For  if  he  was  only  a  '  spiritual '  Messiah,  the 
question  whether  the  customary  belief  in  the  Messiah's  Davidic 
descent  was  justified  or  not  would  have  had  no  interest  for  him 
one  way  or  the  other.  But  here  we  find  him  implying  that  he 
was  the  predicted  theocratic  king,  even  though  he  was  not  of 
Davidic  descent.  He  pits  David  in  the  lioth  Psalm  against 
Isaiah  xi.  Gp.  Pfleiderer,  Urchristentum,  I.  p.  378,  and  also  W., 
who  says :  '  He  regarded  himself  as  the  Messiah,  though  he  was 
not  the  son  of  David.  He  corrects  the  Jewish  conception  ac- 
cording to  which  the  Messiah  is  to  be  a  second  David  and  to 
re-establish  his  ruined  kingdom.'  Menzies  thinks  we  can  do 
adequate  justice  to  the  words  by  supposing  that  their  'obvious' 
point  is  that,  '  on  the  authority  of  David  himself,  a  higher  and 
more  spiritual  view  of  the  Messiah  must  be  substituted  for  the 
current  one.  To  his  own  lineal  descent  Jesus  does  not  refer.' 
Certainly,  if  Jesus  wished  to  teach  '  a  higher  and  more  spiritual 
view  of  the  Messiah,'  he  might,  one  would  have  thought,  have 
adopted  fuller,  clearer  and  more  definite  language.  Might  not 
Cleopas  have  learned  better  than  to  say :  '  we  hoped  that  this  was 
he  who  should  redeem  Israel '  ?  Loisy  says :  '  J^sus  a  conscience 
d'etre  plus  grand  que  Solomon,  plus  grand  que  Jonas,  plus  grand 
que  David  lui-meme,  et  cons6quemment  son  titre  est  sup^rieur 
k  la  filiation  davidique....He  did  not  consider  himself  as  the 
descendant  of  David,  and  anticipated  and  met  the  objection  that 
could  be  taken  from  this  circumstance  against  his  divine  mission. 
Stripped  of  all  theological  subtlety,  his  speech  means  that  the 
Messiah  has  no  need  to  be  son  of  David,  and  that  his  dignity 
comes  from  a  higher  source '  {E.  S.  II.  pp.  361,  363). 

In  a  striking  posthumous  essay  of  the  late  lamented  Professor 
Wrede  ('Jesus  als  Davidssohn'  in  Vortrdgeund  Studien,  147-177X 
whose  early  death  is  so  great  a  loss  to  New  Testament  research, 
the  distinguished  author  essays  to  show  that  the  section  is  not 
authentic.  In  any  case  the  passage  cannot  be  used  to  prove  that 
Jesus  desired  to  show  that  his  Messiahship  was  spiiitual  and 
unpolitical.  For  the  term  '  son  of  David '  had  no  greater  political 
or  national  signification  than  the  term  '  Messiah  '  itself.  Both  re- 
ferred to  a  national  king.  Both  are  mere  titles,  and  the  one  has 
no  more  an  exclusive  political  meaning  than  the  other.  The  only 
meaning  the  passage  can  have  is  in  connection  with  the  question 
of  descent.  '  Whose  son  is  the  Messiah  ? '  Jesus  is  supposed  to 
have  started  the  subject  in  the  course  of  his  teaching.     Wrede 


Xn.  35-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  293 

notes:  (i)  It  is  never  indicated  that  the  fact  that  he  was  not  of 
Davidic  descent  was  thrown  in  Jesus's  teeth  to  show  that  he  was 
not  the  Messiah.  (2)  Where  else  does  Jesus  thus  speak  about  the 
Messiah  or  his  own  Messiahship  to  the  people  ?  (3)  Is  this  kind 
of  argument  characteristic  of  Jesus  ?  Wrede  says  it  gives  him  the 
impression  of  '  Spitzfindigkeit  und  Buchstabelei.'  It  is  more  like 
the  reasonings  of  the  Rabbis.  (This  is  perhaps  a  too  subjective 
argument.)  (4)  It  is  uncertain  whether  at  this  period  Psalm  ex. 
was  currently  interpreted  of  the  Messiah  among  the  Jews.  (5)  If 
Jesus_  attacked  and  denied  the  Davidic  origin  of  the  Messiah,  why 
did  his  teaching  have  no  effect  upon  his  disciples  ?  On  the  other 
hand  Wrede's  own  explanation  of  the  passage  is  not  without  its 
difficulties.  He  supposes  that  it  is  intended  to  press  and  prove 
the  divine  Sonship.  Jesus  is  not  the  son  of  a  man.  In  the 
Letter  of  Barnabas  Psalm  ex.  is  used  to  prove  this  thesis.  But 
the  date  of  this  letter  is  about  120  to  130  a.d.  Wrede  has  to 
assume  that  the  virgin  birth  had  very  early  advocates  and  grew 
up  at  a  very  early  date.  Mark,  though  he  does  not  elsewhere 
allude  to  the  theory,  although  he  includes  many  stories  which 
seem  to  deny  it,  might  yet  have  also  included  one  story  which 
implies  and  defends  it.  Not  even  according  to  the  flesh  is  Jesus 
David's  son.  Except  to  prove  the  divine  Sonship  there  could 
have  been  no  interest  in  disproving  a  descent  from  David.  That 
the  historic  Jesus — a  son  of  a  carpenter  in  Galilee — knew  much 
about  his  own  ancestry  is  very  unlikely.  Directly  Jesus  was 
believed  to  be  the  Messiah,  his  Davidic  descent  would  be  assumed 
as  a  matter  of  course.  But  when  the  divine  Sonship  idea  grew 
up,  then  it  had  to  be  questioned,  and  it  had  to  be  shown  that  the 
Messiah  could  be  proved  from  the  O.T.  itself  not  to  be  the  son  of 
David.  The  positive  side  of  Wrede's  essay  seems  weaker  than  the 
negative  side.  Dalman  practically  assumes  that  Jesus  was  conscious 
of  his  special  divine  Sonship,  and  that  this  is  what  he  is  alluding 
to  here.  He  does  not  obtain  his  Messianic  pretensions  because  he 
is  David's  son,  but  because  he  is  God's  Son.  (The  virgin  birth  is 
not  exactly  affirmed,  nor  is  the  Davidic  descent  exactly  denied.) 
.  Few  critical  readers  will  agree  with  Dalman.  Nor  will  many,  I 
think,  agree  with  the  subtle  explanation  of  B.  Weiss.  His  descent 
from  David  has  nothing  to  do  with  his  mission  and  destiny  as 
Messiah.  Not  because  he  is  David's  son  does  he  obtain  and  fulfil 
these,  but  because  he  is  to  obtain  and  fulfil  these,  therefore  is  he 
David's  son  {Quellen,  A,  p.  57).  It  remains  the  case  that  the 
obvious  explanation  is  the  one  taken  by  W.  and  others.  Jesus  at 
any  rate  depreciates  the  Davidic  descent  and  seems  even  to  deny 
that  the  Messiah  could  be  David's  '  son.'  To  say  that  he  only 
intends  to  put  a  puzzle :  how  is  the  Messiah  both  David's  son  and 


294  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  35-37 

his  lord,  how  can  a  '  son  '  also  be  a  '  lord,'  seems  hardly  to  do  full 
justice  to  the  passage.  But  if  it  does  mean  this,  and  is  authentic 
too,  it  is  certainly  a  powerful  passage  for  those  who  believe  that 
Jesus  had  the  conviction  that  he  was,  or  would  soon  be,  in  some 
way  or  other  more  than  the  ordinary  man.  He  was,  or  would  soon 
be,  the  heavenly  Man,  the  Man  from  the  clouds,  whose  earthly 
genealogy,  in  his  life  before  his  glory,  was  of  no  importance  in 
comparison  with  his  heavenly  nature. 

35.  None  venture  to  question  him.  So  Jesus  in  his  turn  puts 
a  question. 

36.  The  reference  is  to  Psalm  ex.  i. 

37.  TToOev  seems  here  to  mean  merely  '  how.'  How  can  the 
Messiah  be  the  son  of  the  very  man  who  calls  him  '  lord '  ?  Fathers 
do  not  call  their  sons  '  lord.' 

Loisy  thinks  that  the  whole  passage  '  probably  comes  from  a 
good  source,'  but  the  connection  is  only  artificial.  It  is  a  debris  of 
tradition, '  gard^  hors  de  son  cadre  et  de  son  contexte  primitifs.' 
So  too  37  b — the  pleasure  with  which  the  people  listened  to  Jesus 
— is  a  debris  of  the  same  kind,  without  relation  either  to  what 
precedes  or  to  what  follows  {E.  S.  i.  p.  98). 


38-40.    Attack  upon  the  Scribes 
(Gp.  Matt,  xxiii.  i,  6,  7;  Luke  xi.  43,  xx.  46,  47) 

38  And  he  said  unto  them  in  his  teaching,  '  Beware  of  the  scribes, 
who  love  to  walk  in  long  robes,  and  to  be  saluted  in  the  market- 

39  places,  and  to  have  the  first  seats  in  the  synagogues  and  at  feasts: 

40  who  devour  widows'  houses,  and  for  a  pretence  make  long  prayers : 
these  shall  receive  all  the  heavier  punishment.' 

38.  Tmv  OeKovTcav, '  who  like.'  They  are  accused  of  liking  to 
walk  in  long  robes,  and  to  be  respectfully  greeted  in  the  market- 
place, and  to  have  the  best  seats  at  synagogues  and  banquets. 
The  next  verse  deals  with  moral  offences.  They  are  hypocrites  in 
prayer,  and  rob  the  widow.  How  the  last  charge  was  carried  out 
in  practice  is  not  stated.  It  is  perhaps  implied  that  they  acquired 
an  authority  over  women,  and  let  themselves  be  richly  paid  for 
their  advice.  Some  think  that  they  obtained  money  by  offering 
to  pray  for  them.  This  charge  is  not  in  Matthew.  It  is  peculiar  to 
Mark.  These  charges,  if  applied  to  a  whole  class,  refute  them- 
selves by  their  violence.     There  were  good  and  bad  Eabbis  then, 


XII.  41-44]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  295 

as  there  have  always  been  good  and  bad  priests  and  good  and  bad 
clergymen.  For  the  Talmudic  evidence  about  the  morals  of  the 
Pharisees  and  Scribes  of  this  period,  see  Additional  Note  25.  We 
may  assume  that  it  was  the  bad  Pharisees  and  Rabbis  (Mark,  it 
is  to  be  noted,  does  not  here  mention  the  Pharisees)  who  were 
attacked  by  Jesus.  The  Talmud  speaks  of  hypocritical  Pharisees, 
who  loved  to  show  off  a  pretended  piety.  The  Assumption  of 
Moses  it  is  believed  by  some  scholars  alludes  to  Pharisees  who 
are  pretenders  and  hypocrites  and  eat  the  property  of  the  poor. 
Josephus  usually  praises  the  Pharisees  and  dilates  upon  their  good 
qualities.  In  one  place,  however  (Ant.  book  xvii.  2),  he  speaks 
of  them  as  a  party  {jxopiov)  jepaipeiv  to  Oeiov  Trpocnroi.ov/ji.evov 
(raaking  men  believe  that  they  are  favoured  by  God),  and  he  says 
that  the  women  were  influenced  by  them  (oh  virfjKTo  rj  yvvMKa)- 
vln<;).     There  was  doubtless  some  material  for  attack. 

From  another  point  of  view  these  verses  raise  great  problems. 
Are  they  all  which  Mark  knew  of  any  attack  upon  the  Scribes  in 
Jerusalem  ?  Wellhausen  would,  I  suppose,  say  yes.  Loisy,  on  the 
other  hand,  thinks  quite  differently.  He  thinks  that  the  long 
oration  (mainly  from  Q)  in  Matt,  xxiii.  against  the  Pharisees  was 
known  to  Mark,  just  as  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  was  known  to 
him.  'Le  r^dacteur  abrege  le  discours  que  contenait  la  source 
commune  de  Matthieu  et  de  Luc ;  mais  on  dirait  que  ce  resume 
a  ^t^  fait  de  mdmoire,  sans  souci  d'exactitude,  par  un  homme  qui 
avait  ^galement  dans  I'esprit  le  discours  centre  ostentation  dans 
I'accomplissement  des  ceuvres  de  pietd '  (E.  S.  Ii.  p.  364).  B.  Weiss 
of  course  takes  the  same  line.  He  argues  cleverly  that  the  awkward 
grammar  of  38  and  39  (deXovrmv  first  joined  with  the  infinitive  and 
then  with  the  accusative)  is  merely  due  to  a  reminiscence  of  what 
we  now  read  in  Matt,  xxiii.  6,  7  (Quellen,  A,  p.  148). 

41-44.     The  Widow's  Mite 
(Cp.  Luke  xxi.  1-4) 

41  And  Jesus  sat  down  opposite  the  treasury,  and  watched  the 
people  throwing  money  into  the  treasury:  and  many  that  were 

42  rich  cast  in  much.     And  a  poor  widow  came  and  threw  in  two 

43  farthings,  which  make  a  halfpenny.  And  he  called  unto  him  his 
disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  this  poor 
widow  has  thrown  in  more  than  all  who  have  thrown  into  the 

44  treasury :  for  all  they  threw  in  from  their  superfluity ;  but  she 
from  her  poverty  has  thrown  in  all  that  she  possessed,  even  all 
her  living.' 


296  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XII.  41-44 

41.  For  the  'treasury'  and  its  arrangements  see  Encyclopcedia 
Biblica,  s.v.  'Temple,'  par.  36,  and  Hastings,  Dictionary  of  the  Bible, 
5.D.' Treasury.'  ;)^a\Koi/  does  not  mean  here  probably '  copper  money,' 
'  small  change '  literally,  but  rather  '  money '  generally.  For  rich 
people  were  there  also,  giving  much. 

42.  She  puts  in  two  separate  '  mites,'  though  she  could  have 
kept  one  for  herself.  Xettto  Bvo,  '  two  lepta.'  The  '  lepton '  was 
half  a  'kodrantes'  {i.e.  the  Latin  quadrans).  Thus  it  was  the 
eighth  part  of  an  as,  and  the  one  hundred  and  twenty-eighth  part 
of  a  denarius.  (The  value  of  a  denarius  was  about  ninepence.)  A 
lepton  was  the  smallest  copper  coin  in  circulation,  and  less  than  a 
third  of  a  farthing.  In  contrast  to  the  bad  Scribes,  who  'eat' 
widows'  property,  we  have  now  the  tale  of  the  good  widow  and 
her  sacrifice. 

44.  '  All  her  living '  or  possessions  {o\ov  rov  ^iov)  must  be 
understood  to  mean  all  that  she  possessed  at  the  moment.  The 
S.S.  omits  the  words;  they  may  be  a  gloss  (Klostermann).  The 
moral  of  the  story  is  quite  Rabbinic.  There  is  no  new  touch 
in  what  Jesus  says  here,  though  W.  observes  that  the  little  tale 
goes  more  to  one's  heart  than  all  the  miracles,  of  which  the  first 
part  of  Mark  is  full. 

W.  notices  that,  except  for  the  fig  tree,  Jesus  performs  no 
miracles  in  Jerusalem,  and  works  no  healings  or  exorcisms.  More- 
over, the  difference  between  chapters  xi.  and  xii.  and  the  previous 
section  viu.  27-x.  45  is  very  noticeable.  'The  mournful  mood 
which  Jesus  showed  on  the  way  to  Jerusalem  ceases  in  Jerusalem 
itself;  it  gives  place  to  a  mood  of  confidence  and  energy.  Jesus 
seems  buoyed  up  by  the  enthusiasm  of  the  multitude.  The  near 
and  certain  death  does  not  fill  his  heart  or  his  words;  there  is  only 
one  prediction  of  death,  and  that  is  in  the  interpolated  parable  of 
the  vineyard.  The  purification  of  the  Temple  brings  about  a 
conflict  with  the  chief  priests,  but  Jesus  avoids  accentuating  it; 
he  bears  himself  with  caution  and  cleverness  against  his  opponents, 
and  yet  without  concessions  or  compromise.  We  hear  no  words 
about  the  inevitableness  of  the  cross,  not  only  for  him,  but  also  for 
his  disciples,  about  their  having  to  follow  him  to  death,  or  about  the 
complete  renunciation  of  the  world  in  view  of  the  near  approach 
of  the  Kingdom;  the  sections  xii.  28-34  and  x.  17-31,  though 
outwardly  alike,  are  inwardly  totally  dissimilar.  These  deep-going 
differences  are  hardly  to  be  explained  by  the  fact  that  in  xi.  and 
xii.  Jesus  is  no  longer  speaking,  as  in  viii.  27-x.  45,  privately  to 
the  disciples,  but  openly  before  the  people  at  large.  And  why  in 
Jerusalem  does  he  no  longer  speak  to  his  disciples,  except  in  the 
certainly  spurious  apocalypse  xiii.,  and  on  the  last  day  ?     He  had 


XIII.  1-37]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  297 

opportunity  enough  during  the  evenings  at  Bethany  to  talk  to 
them  about  himself  and  the  meaning  of  his  imminent  sufferings 
and  death,  and  yet  not  a  word  is  reported  about  it.' 

The  legitimate  deduction  from  these  observations  which  W., 
I  presume,  would  have  us  draw  is  that  the  picture  of  Jesus  in 
Jerusalem,  as  given  in  xi.  and  xii.,  is  more  authentic  and  more 
historic  than  the  deviating  picture  of  him  as  given  in  viiL 
2;-x.  45, 

CHAPTER  XIII 

1-37.    The  End  and  the  'Parousia' 
{Cp.  Matt.  xxiv.  1-36;  Luke  xxi.  5-33) 

1  And  as  he  went  out  of  the  temple,  one  of  his  disciples  said 
unto   him,   'Master,   see,   what  grand   stones   and   what    grand 

2  buildings !'  And  Jesus,  answering,  said  unto  him,  '  Seest  thou 
these  great  buildings  ?  There  shall  not  be  left  one  stone  upon 
another,  which  shall  not  be  thrown  down.' 

3  And  as  he  sat  upon  the  mount  of  Olives  over  against  the 
temple,   Peter    and   James   and  John   and   Andrew   asked   him 

4  privately,  '  Tell  us,  when  shall  these  things  be  ?  and  what  is  the 
sign  when  all  these  things  are  to  be  fulfilled  ?' 

5  And  Jesus,  answering  them,  began  to  say, '  Take  heed  lest  any 

6  man  lead  you  astray :  for  many  will  come  in  my  name,  saying.  It 

7  is  I,  and  they  shall  lead  many  astray.  And  when  ye  hear  of  wars 
and  rumours  of  wars,  be  ye  not  alarmed ;  for  these  things  must 

8  happen;  but  the  End  is  not  yet.  For  nation  will  rise  against 
nation,  and  kingdom  against  kingdom :  and  there  will  be  earth- 
quakes in  divers  places,  and  there  will  be  famines :  these  are  the 
beginnings  of  the  Pangs. 

9  '  But  ye — take  heed  to  yourselves :  for  they  will  deliver  you 
up  to  law  courts ;  and  in  synagogues  ye  will  be  beaten :  and  ye 
will  be  brought  before  rulers  and  kings  for  my  sake,  to  bear 

10  witness  before  them.     For  the  gospel  must  first  be  proclaimed 

11  unto  all  nations.  But  when  they  take  you  away,  and  deliver  you 
up,  have  no  care  beforehand  what  ye  shall  speak,  but  whatsoever 
shall  be  given  you  in  that  hour,  that  speak  ye :  for  it  is  not  ye 

12  that  speak,  but  the  Holy  Spirit.     And  brother  will  deliver  up 


298  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

brother  to  death,  and  the  father  his  son ;  and  children  will  rise  up 

13  against  their  parents,  and  will  put  them  to  death.  And  ye  will 
be  hated  of  all  men  for  my  name's  sake :  but  he  that  endureth 
unto  the  end,  he  shall  be  saved. 

14  '  But  when  ye  shall  see  the  Abomination  of  Desolation,  stand- 
ing where  it  ought  not  (let  him  that  readeth  give  heed),  then  let 

15  them  that  be  in  Judaea  flee  to  the  mountains :  and  let  him  that 
is  on  the  roof  not  go  down  into  the  house,  neither  enter  therein, 

16  to  take  anything  out  of  his  house:   and  let  him  that  is  in  the 

17  field  not  go  back  to  fetch  his  cloak.     But  woe  to  them  that  are 

18  with  child,  and  to  them  that  give  suck  in  those  days!    And  pray 

19  ye  that  it  may  not  be  in  the  winter.  For  in  those  days  there 
will  be  affliction,  such  as  hath  not  been  from  the  beginning  of  the 

20  world  which  God  created  until  now,  and  will  not  be  again.  And 
if  the  Lord  had  not  shortened  those  days,  no  flesh  would  be 
saved :  but  for  the  elect's  sake,  whom  he  hath  chosen  out,  he  hath 

21  shortened  the  days.     And  then  if  any  man  shall  say  to  you,  Lo, 

22  here  is  the  Messiah;  or,  lo,  he  is  there;  believe  him  not.  For 
false  Messiahs  and  false  prophets  will  arise,  and  will  perform 
signs  and  wonders,  to  cause  the  elect,  if  it  be  possible,  to  go 

23  astray.  But  take  ye  heed :  behold,  I  have  foretold  everything 
unto  you. 

24  'But   in   those    days,  after   that    affliction,  the  sun   will   be 

25  darkened,  and  the  moon  will  not  give  her  light,  and  the  stars 
will  fall  from  heaven,  and  the  heavenly  powers  will  be  shaken. 

26  And  then  will  be  seen  the  Son  of  man  coming  on  the  clouds  with 

27  great  power  and  glory.  And  then  he  will  send  out  the  angels,  and 
will  gather  together  his  elect  from  the  four  winds,  from  the  utter- 
most part  of  the  earth  to  the  uttermost  part  of  heaven. 

28  '  From  the  fig  tree  learn  a  parable :  when  its  branch  becometh 

29  soft,  and  it  putteth  forth  leaves,  ye  know  that  summer  is  near ;  so, 
too,  ye,  when  ye  see  these  things  happening,  know  that  he  is  nigh, 
even  at  the  door. 

20        'Verily  I  say  unto  you,  that  this  generation  shall  not  pass 

31  away,  till  all  these  things  shall  have  taken  place.     Heaven  and 

32  earth  shall  pass  away :  but  my  words  shall  not  pass  away.  But  as 
to  that  day  and  as  to  the  hour,  no  man  knoweth,  not  even  the 
angels  who  are  in  heaven,  and  not  even  the  Son,  but  only  the  Father. 


XIII.  1-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  299 

i3, 34  *  Take  ye  heed,  watch :  for  ye  know  not  when  the  time  is.  For 
'  it  is  as  if  a  man  went  abroad,  and  left  his  house,  and  gave  authority 
1         to  his  servants,  and  to  every  man  his  work,  and  commanded  the 

35  porter  to  watch.     Watch  ye  therefore :  for  ye  know  not  when  the 
master  of  the  house  cometh,  whether  at  even,  or  at  midnight,  or 

36  at  the  cockcrowing,  or  in  the  early  morning :  lest  coming  suddenly, 

37  he  find  you  sleeping.     And  what  I  say  unto  you,  I  say  unto  all: 
Watch.' 

This  apocalyptic  oration  is,  as  a  whole,  certainly  unauthentic. 
Much  of  it  is  built  up  upon  the  familiar  lines  of  Jewish  apocalypses 
from  Daniel  (164  B.C.)  onwards.  It  has  very  slight  interest  for  us 
to-day,  and  little  or  no  religious  value.  Judaism  freed  itself  of 
apocalyptic  dreamings  sooner  than  Christianity,  but  both  religions 
have  long  advanced  beyond  them  now. 

How  much  of  the  oration  from  5  to  37  goes  back  to  Jesus  is 
very  doubtful.  Verse  32  seems  most  likely  to  be  authentic.  As 
regards  the  rest,  the  portions  which  are  of  Jewish  origin,  or  of 
Christian  origin,  or,  lastly,  which  proceeded  from  the  mouth  of 
Jesus,  can  never  be  distinguished  with  certainty.  The  oldest 
parts,  representing  the  original  Jewish  apocalypse,  may  be  7,  8, 
14-20  and  24-31.  Christian  editors,  including  the  Evangelist, 
will  account  for  what  remains.  It  is  even  questionable  whether 
any  part  was  said  by  Jesus  of  what  we  now  possess.  J.  Weiss 
indeed  argues  that  there  is  no  reason  why  Jesus  should  not  have 
conceived  of  the  future  upon  the  ordinary  lines  of  the  prevailing 
Jewish  apocalyptic  teaching.  Because  people  to-day  dislike  the 
fantastic  doctrines  and  conceptions  of  the  apocalyptic  writers,  that 
is  no  reason  why  Jesus  should  not  have  shared  them.  'Wie  er 
sich  mit  seiner  Messiasvorstellung  an  die  Weissagung  des  Daniel 
angeschlossen  hat,  so  werden  auch  in  anderen  Zukunftsdingen 
die  Lehren  der  Apocalyptik  fiir  ihn  massgebend  gewesen  sein.' 
As  the  chapter  is  of  little  or  no  religious  value  to  us  to-day,  it 
is  not  necessary  for  me  to  discuss  the  question  of  origin  and  source 
at  any  length.  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  with  the  exception  of  the 
words  in  verse'  2,  W.  rejects  the  whole.  At  the  other  extreme 
stands  B.  Weiss,  who  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  any '  Jewish 
apocalypse'  theory.  For  Weiss  practically  the  whole  of  the 
apocalypse  in  Mark  from  5  to  32  comes  from  Q  {i.e.  6,  8-21, 
24-31).  If  it  was  all  in  Q,  then,  I  presume,  Weiss  would  say  it  is 
all  authentic.  In  between  these  two  extremes  stands  Loisy  who 
accepts  the  theory  of  a  Jewish  apocalypse  for  6-8, 14, 17-20, 24-3 1, 
and  thinks  that  Mark  has  expanded  these  passages  by  bits  taken 
from  Q,  and  relating  to  the  conduct  which  the  disciples  will  have 


300  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

to  follow  dtiring  the  age  of  persecutions,  to  the  coming  of  the 
Kingdom  and  to  the  right  preparation  for  that  coming.  The  end 
of  the  speech  (33-37)  is  a  sort  of  abridgment  of  parables  in  which 
Jesus  recommended  his  hearers  to  keep  themselves  ready  for  the 
sudden  and  unexpected  manifestation  of  the  Kingdom  (^.  S.  I.  p.  99). 
The  verses  which  Loisy  thinks  are  from  Q  will  be  pointed  out  in 
their  proper  place.  It  may,  however,  be  added  here  that  the 
occurrence  of  a  passage  in  Q  is  not  by  any  means  an  absolute  proof 
of  its  authenticity. 

I,  2.  Probably  Menzies  and  other  commentators  are  right  in 
supposing  that  a  very  marked  difference  must  be  made  between  1, 2, 
and  the  rest  of  the  chapter.  They  strongly  press  the  authenticity 
of  2.  On  the  other  hand  for  the  date  of  Mark  as  a  whole,  Wemle 
may  be  right  in  arguing  that  if  the  Temple  had  stood  when  he 
wrote,  its  utter  destruction  would  hardly  have  been  put  in  the  fore- 
front of  the  discourse  on  the  future.  Yet  the  Temple  was  burnt, 
not  destroyed  in  the  way  indicated  in  2.  And  its  destruction  is 
not  alluded  to  in  the  rest  of  the  chapter.  In  Revelation  xL  i,  2 
it  is  assumed  that  the  actual  Temple  will  be  spared.  It  is,  more- 
over, not  unlikely  that  Jesus,  like  a  new  Jeremiah,  should  have 
predicted  the  destruction  of  the  Temple.  This  may  account  for 
the  hostility  felt  towards  him,  perhaps  even  for  the  revulsion  of 
popular  feeling.  It  is  in  accordance  with  his  prophetic  character  that 
Jesus  should  predict  the  destruction  of  the  Temple.  It  is  also  in 
accordance  with  the  spiritual  character  of  his  religion.  It  is  also  a 
mark  of  his  originality,  and  of  his  elevation  above  the  religious 
level  of  his  age.  For  though  it  is  exaggerated  to  say  that  the 
Jews  believed  that  God  lived  in  the  Temple  and  not  elsewhere,  or 
that  the  presence  of  God  among  his  people  was  conditioned  by  the 
existence  of  the  Temple,  the  old  ideas  did  still  hang  about  men's 
minds,  and  the  continuance  of  the  religion  apart  from  the  Temple, 
and  all  the  better  for  its  loss,  was  hard  to  conceive. 

The  question  is  put,  and  the  answer  is  made,  privately ;  it  is 
not  said  that  the  pronouncement  in  2  was  said  publicly,  but 
some  prediction  of  the  kind  must  have  got  abroad  (cp.  xiv.  58). 
Loisy  thinks  that  the  wording  of  2  cannot  perhaps  be  pressed  as  a 
mark  of  authenticity.  It  may  be  merely  a  conventional  way  of 
expressing  the  complete  ruin  of  the  building.  He  is  inclined  to 
hold  that  the  present  wording  of  the  prophecy  of  2  has  been 
substituted  for  the  words :  '  I  will  destroy  this  temple  and  rebuild 
it  in  three  days.'  Jesus  would  not  have  referred  in  that  case  to 
the  destruction  of  the  Temple  by  human  enemies,  but  to  his  own 
action  after  his  Glory.  The  material  Temple  would  be  ended,  and  a 
'  spiritual '  Temple  put  in  its  place  {E.  S.  11.  p.  396).    This  hypothesis, 


XIII.  1-37]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDINQ  TO  MARK  30 1 

tentatively  and  hesitatingly  put  forward,  does  not  seem  to  me 
very  likely.  But  Loisy  seems  on  safer  ground  when  he  points  out 
how  natural  it  was  that  the  anxious  desire  to  know  when  the  End — 
the  advent  of  the  Messiah  in  glory — would  come,  should  manifest 
itself  as  the  years  went  by,  after  the  crucifixion,  and  nothing 
happened.  On  the  other  hand,  the  most  authentic  of  the  utterances 
of  Jesus  seem  to  show  that  while  he  always  regarded  the  End  as 
imminent  he  did  not,  for  that  very  reason,  announce  any  particular 
signs  of  it.  On  the  contrary,  he  denied  that  there  would  be  such 
signs  over  and  above  his  own  preaching  and  teaching  and  miracles. 
Thus  M.  Loisy  says : 

'  The  question  raised  in  the  three  Synoptics  is  not  in  harmony 
with  the  situation  a  few  days  before  the  death  of  the  Saviour,  but 
with  that  of  Christian  believers  who,  some  forty  or  fifty  years 
after  the  Passion,  made  great  efforts  to  reconcile  what  Jesus 
had  really  said  concerning  the  approaching  End  with  the  post- 
ponement of  that  End.  The  explanation,  easily  found,  was  that 
certain  things  had  to  happen  first ;  these  things  were  the  signs  of 
the  End  which  was  to  come  immediately  after  them ;  the  apocalyptic 
tradition  described  them,  and  it  was  not  very  difficult  to  link  its 
indications  to  certain  very  authentic  details  of  Jesus's  teaching, 
such  as  the  words  about  the  destruction  of  the  Temple,  which 
were  fulfilled  by  Titus,  though  in  a  sense  very  different  from  that 
in  which  Jesus  had  intended  them.  In  this  way  the  apocalyptic 
anticipations,  which  seem  to  have  had  no  place  in  the  preaching 
of  the  Saviour,  have  been  introduced  into  the  literary  tradition  of 
the  Gospel '  {E.  S.  11.  p.  400). 

And  Loisy  uses  Luke  xvii.  20  and  xii.  54  as  strong  proofs  of 
his  argument : 

'Apart  therefore  from  the  great  apocalyptic  discourse,  the 
attitude  of  the  Christ  in  regard  to  this  question  of  signs  was  in- 
variable and  his  teaching  very  consistent.  The  truth  of  his  words 
was  to  be  proved  by  the  event,  and  it  was  these  words  which  were 
the  sign  of  that  approaching  event,  of  the  Judgment  of  God  which 
was  about  to  come.  No  other  signs  were  needed;  the  sign  was  being 
given,  he  was  present.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  remark  that  this  view 
is  incompatible  with  that  which  is  at  the  root  of  the  apocalyptic 
discourse,  where  we  find  the  description  of  a  series  of  events,  that 
is  to  say  of  signs,  which  were  to  be  the  indications  of  the  Parousia. 
In  this  fact  lies  one  of  the  strongest  arguments,  if  not  the  strongest, 
which  can  be  alleged  against  the  authenticity  of  the  Synoptic  apoca- 
lypse. Unless  we  admit  two  contradictory  currents  in  the  thought 
and  teaching  of  Jesus,  we  are  compelled  to  choose  between  the 
declarations  which  exhibit  the  Kingdom  as  imminent  without  any 
other  sign  than  the  Gospel  itself  and  those  which  exhibit  it  as 


302  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

delayed  till  after  a  series  of  events  which  were  to  be  accomplished 
before  it  was  realized.  The  choice  of  the  historian  cannot  be 
doubtful ;  the  declarations  of  the  first  series  are  in  keeping  with 
the  teaching  of  Jesus ;  those  of  the  second  series  are  an  apologetic 
explanation  of  the  delay,  which,  notwithstanding  the  declarations 
of  the  Saviour  himself,  the  Parousia  experienced'  {E.  S.  II. 
p.  405). 

4.  What  is  ravTa  ('this'  or  'these  things')?  In  this  connection 
it  would  seem  to  mean  the  destruction  of  the  Temple  as  a  sign  of 
the  beginning  of  the  End.  But  really  what  the  disciples  ask  is 
something  different.  They  want  to  know  what  is  to  be  the  sign 
of  the  body  of  events  which  are  to  prelude  and  mark  the  coming 
of  the  End.  ravra  looks  forward,  not  back.  The  question  is  really 
twofold :  When  will  the  End  be  ?  By  what  sign  will  one  recognize 
its  imminence  ?  What  is  to  be  the  indication  that  the  End  of 
the  existing  order  of  things  is  at  hand  ?  When  will  the  Son  of 
man  come  ?  Loisy  notes  that  the  apocalyptic  oration  is  said 
privately  to  the  four  disciples  only — a  mark  of  its  secondary 
character  (cp.  iv.  10,  vii.  17,  &c.).  It  is  not  a  real  speech,  but  'a 
description  made  to  be  read.' 

5-37.  The  apocalyptic  oration  now  begins.  The  old  original 
apocalypse  has  three  parts  or  divisions — '  tableaux '  as  M.  Loisy 
calls  them.  In  the  first  are  described  certain  preliminaries  of 
the  great  event  (5-8);  in  the  second  we  have  the  desolation  of 
Judsea  (14-20);  the  third  tells  of  the  commotion  of  the  heavenly 
bodies  and  the  appearance  of  the  Son  of  man  (24-31).  Matter 
which  does  not  belong  to  the  original  apocalypse  opens  the 
speech,  and  is  added  after  each  section.  Thus  to  the  first  section 
are  added  the  verses  9-13,  to  the  second  21 -23,  to  the  third  32-37. 
The  additions  are  mainly  warnings  and  instructions  how  to 
behave  in  view  of  or  during  the  great  event;  they  teach  how 
one  may  traverse,  without  injury  to  one's  eternal  salvation,  the 
troublous  days  which  are  to  precede  the  End  of  the  present  order 
and  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom. 

5.  The  opening  words  contained  in  this  verse  may  be  the 
composition  of  the  Evangelist.  Note  /SXeTrere  four  times  repeated 
(S.  9.  23,  33).  There  is  a  practical  object  in  what  is  to  follow. 
Mark  not  only  wants  to  explain  the  delay  in  the  coming  of 
the  Messiah  in  glory,  but  perhaps  also  to  urge  that  even  the 
troubles  of  the  period  in  which  he  lived  (near  70  A.D.)  were 
not  the  signs  of  the  End.     They  were  at  most  premonitions. 

6.  This  verse  is  obscure.     It  is  doubtful  whether  it  comes 


XIII.  1-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  303 

from  the  old  apocalypse,  or  whether  it  is  an  addition.  As  it 
stands  it  can  only  allude  to  persons  who  not  only  pretended  to  be 
the  Messiah,  but  Jesus  the  Messiah.  They  are  people  who  come 
using  the  name  of  Jesus  and  who  say  that  they  are  Jesus.  Of 
such  false  claimants  we  know  nothing.  If  the  verse  belongs  to 
the  old  apocalypse,  Loisy  thinks  we  might  assume  that  God  was 
the  speaker.  The  deceivers  come  and  speak  in  the  name  of  God. 
They  say,  'I  am  he,'  that  is  not  necessarily  the  Messiah,  but 
God's  messenger,  an  inspired  prophet  or  the  like.  We  know  of 
nobody  before  Bar  Cochba,  who  claimed  to  be  the  Messiah,  but  the 
mere  claim  of  being  divinely  sent  or  inspired  might  be  ascribed  to 
Judas  the  Galilsean,  to  Theudas,  to  the  promoters  of  the  great 
revolt  or  even,  if  the  apocalypse  is  of  Jewish  origin,  to  the 
initiators  of  the  Christian  movement  {E.  S.  11.  p.  402).  But  even 
this  explanation  is  awkward. 

7.  What  are  these  wars  ?  As  the  verse  comes  from  the  old 
apocalypse  (of  which  the  date  may  be  somewhere  between  60  and 
70),  the  wars  need  not  necessarily  refer  exclusively  to  the  war 
between  the  Jews  and  Rome.  Yet  the  beginning  of  the  troubles 
between  Judeea  and  Rome  are  probably  referred  to.  The  wars 
are  the  preliminaries  of  the  End. 

8.  dpx^  (ohivatv  ravra,  '  these  are  the  beginnings  of  the 
Pangs.'  The  allusion  is  to  the  Rabbinic  doctrine  of  the  pains 
(the  travail  or  labour  pains  of  the  Messiah).  W.  translates  ooSivoav 
as  if  it  were  an  epexegetical  genitive  :  '  these  things  are  (only)  the 
beginning — the  pains.' 

9-13.  Mark's  addition  to  the  first  section  of  the  apocalypse. 
Gp.  the  parallels  in  Matt.  x.  17-22,  xxiv.  9-14;  Luke  xii.  11,  12, 
xxi.  12-19.  Have  we  to  suppose  with  Bousset,  B.  Weiss,  Loisy 
and  others  that  the  substance  of  the  passage  was  already  in  Q — 
in  the  speech  to  the  apostles  when  they  were  sent  out  on  their 
preaching  mission  in  Galilee  ?  In  that  case  surely  there  were 
passages  in  Q  which  were  later  than  Jesus  and  never  proceeded 
from  his  mouth. 

9.  The  Christians  will  be  persecuted  and  ill-used  by  both 
Jews  and  heathens.  '  To  bear  witness  before  them.'  They  witness 
to  the  truth  of  the  gospel  by  their  endurance  under  persecution 
and  pain.  The  'witness'  becomes  the  '  martyr.'  Matt.  x.  18  has, '  To 
bear  witness  to  them  (the  Jews)  and  to  the  heathen  (lit.  nations).' 

10.  This  verse  is  not  found  in  Matt.  x.  Loisy  regards  it  as  a 
paraphrase  or  enlargement  of  the  omitted  words  in  the  preceding 


304  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

verse  '  and  to  the  heathen.'  The  passage  is,  nevertheless,  an  in- 
terruption, for  II  is  the  proper  sequel  to  9.  Though  a  similar 
phrase  is  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  xiv.  9,  the  verse  is 
probably  due  to  the  influence  of  Paul  {E.  S.  11.  p.  413). 

12.  A  customary  trait  in  the  description  of  the  pangs  of  the 
Messiah  in  Jewish  apocalypses.  For  its  O.T.  basis  see  Micah  vii.  6. 
W.  does  not  quite  agree  with  Loisy  as  to  the  Jewish  sections  of 
the  chapter:  he  ascribes  to  this  source  verses  7,  8,  12,  14-22, 
24-27. 

14-20.     The  second  section  of  the  apocalypse. 

14.  '  The  Abomination  of  Desolation.'  The  reference  is  to 
Daniel  ix.  27,  xi.  31,  xii.  11.  The  phrase  of  Daniel  is  supposed  to 
signify  the  altar  of  Zeus  set  up  by  Antiochus  Epiphanes  upon 
the  altar  in  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem.  Probably  the  rendering 
'  Desolation  '  is  wrong.  It  should  be  the  '  Abomination  of  Horror,' 
i.e.  a  horrible  abomination.  Perhaps  the  writer  of  this  apocalypse 
in  Mark  did  not  know  more  than  that  it  was  to  be  a  profanation 
of  the  Temple.     Or,  'the  outrage  on  Jewish  feeling  which  he 

anticipates  is  the  setting  up  of  the  worship  of  a  living  man 

The  Emperor's  image  [may  be  placed]  where  it  ought  not — 
namely,  in  the  Holy  of  Holies'  (Menzies,  who  thinks  that  the 
apocalypse  was  put  in  circulation  a  few  months  before  the  capture 
of  Jerusalem).  Note  that  it  is  not  anywhere  clearly  implied  that 
the  Temple  will  be  destroyed.  Hence  the  date  is  presumably 
prior  to  70.  It  may  be  that  an  attack  by  powers  of  darkness 
upon  the  Temple  is  meant.  There  is  no  allusion  to  the  war  with 
Titus. 

'  Let  him  that  readeth  give  heed ' ;  either  an  indication  that  the 
apocalypse  was  written,  not  said,  or  an  interpolation  fipom  Matthew, 
for  there  the  book  of  Daniel  is  directly  quoted.  In  the  second 
alternative  the  meaning  is, '  let  the  reader  of  Daniel  mark.'  The 
first  alternative  is  more  probable. 

The  inhabitants  of  Judaea  are  not  to  take  refuge  in  the  capital, 
for  things  there  will  be  even  worse.  These  horrors  are  the  true 
beginning  of  the  true  End. 

15.  The  staircase,  W.  says,  was  (at  least  in  the  village  houses) 
outside,  and  led  on  to  the  street. 

20.  '  No  flesh ' ;  the  horizon  of  the  writer  is  for  the  moment 
Umited  to  Palestine.  M.  Loisy,  on  the  contrary,  thinks  all  mankind 
and  not  the  Jews  only  are  referred  to.  For  the  sake  of  the  elect, 
the  interval  between  the  beginning  of  the  End  and  the  End  itself 
is  made  short. 


XIII.  1-37]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  305 

Almost  all  the  apocalyptic  writers  are  hard:  they  delight  in 
horrors ;  many  will  perish ;  few  will  survive ;  many  are  '  lost ' ; 
few  are  '  saved ' ;  these  are  their  cruel  and  favourite  common- 
places. Dr  Carpenter  thinks  that  the  sudden  lapse  from  prophecy 
to  retrospect  makes  it  probable  that  this  verse  was  a  note  added 
later. 

21,  22.  These  verses  may  also  be  of  Jewish  origin.  Loisy 
thinks  that  they  are  not  part  of  the  main  apocalypse.  He 
regards  the  passage  as  taken  from  another  oration  upon  the 
same  subject.  Of  false  Messiahs,  we  know  of  none  among  the 
Jews  till  Bar  Cochba  in  131.  Are  these  deceivers  supposed  to  be 
Jewish  impostors,  whose  miracles  might  seduce  even  the  disciples 
of  Jesus  ?  (cp.  verse  6).  For  false  prophets,  cp.  Acts  v.  36,  viii. 
9-1 1,  xxi.  38;  Revelation  xiii.  n-17.  'False  Messiahs'  is  not 
found  in  the  MS.  D. 

24-3 1 .     The  third  section  and  act  of  the  apocal3rpse. 

24.  The  days  and  the  tribulation  refer  to  what  was  said  in 
verse  20.     The  End,  the  denouement,  is  at  hand. 

26.  The  'Son  of  man.'  The  "Abomination'  is  the  sign  of  the 
beginning  of  the  End;  the  'Son  of  man'  is  the  sign  of  its  con- 
summation (cp.  Daniel  vii.  13). 

Holtzmann  says :  '  When  the  apocalyptic  Son  of  man  (from 
Daniel)  took  the  place  of  the  old  prophetic  son  of  David,  the 
earthly  form  of  the  Messiah  seemed  merely  the  necessary  pre- 
hminary  to  his  heavenly  form,  upon  which  the  main  emphasis 
now  fell.' 

Originally,  says  W.,  the  Son  of  man  was  not  identified  and 
identical  with  the  Christian  Messiah  in  this  apocalypse.  But  the 
Christian  redactor  made  this  identification.  To  him  Son  of  man 
equals  Messiah,  and  Messiah  equals  Jesus.  Here,  then,  we  mark  the 
transition  to  the  Christianising  of  the  term  'Son  of  man,'  and  to 
its  being  stamped  afresh  as  a  sort  of  proper  name  for  Jesus — at 
first  for  the  Jesus  of  the  Parousia.  This  is  in  accordance  with 
W.'s  theory  that  Jesus  himself  did  not  call  himself  the  Son  of 
man.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  Jesus  believed  that  he  was,  or 
would,  as  it  were,  turn  into,  the  heavenly  Son  of  man  predicted 
by  Daniel  and  the  apocalyptic  dreamers,  then  he  could  have 
adopted  such  a  verse  as  this,  and  meant  it  of  himself. 

27.  The  'elect'  Jews  are  gathered  in  from  the  dispersion. 
But  to  the  editor,  to  Mark,  the  '  elect '  are  the  Christians.  The 
apocalypse  is  here,  at  all  events,  pleasantly  silent  over  the  final 
destruction  of  enemies  and  the  wicked.    'From  the  uttermost  part 

U.  20 


3o6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

of  the  earth  to  the  uttermost  part  of  heaven'  is  a  queer  mixture, 
made  up  of  such  passages  as  Deut.  xxx.  4  and  xiii.  7. 

28-31.  Loisy  regards  these  verses  as  part  of  the  original 
apocalypse.  He  thinks  that,  'the  absolute  assertion  concerning 
the  words  which  will  not  pass  away  is  in  the  ordinary  tone  of  the 
apocalypses  much  more  than  in  that  of  the  Gospel.  Jesus  did  not 
thus  speak  of  his  teaching,  and  it  may  be  supposed  that  the 
seer,  the  original  author  of  the  apocalyptic  discourse,  was  making 
God  Himself,  and  not  the  Christ  speak '  {E.  S.  il.  p.  436).  W.,  on 
the  other  hand,  thinks  that  28-31,  as  well  as  32-37  'are  later 
than  the  apocalypse.  They  are  purely  Christian,  and  date,  as  it 
would  seem,  from  the  period  after  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.' 

28,  29.  The  parable  of  the  fig  tree.  It  does  not,  at  first,  seem 
much  of  a  parable.  As  the  foliage  of  the  fig  tree  means  the 
approach  of  the  summer,  so  the  '  signs '  of  chapter  xiii.  mean  the 
coming  of  the  End.  '  In  24-27  the  End  itself  had  been  described. 
But  time  had  shown  that  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  was  not 
the  End,  after  all.  So  it  was  made  merely  a  preliminary  sign  of 
the  End.  These  postponements  and  changes  are  characteristic  of 
apocalypse '  (W.). 

The  parable  of  the  fig  tree  may  have  more  meaning  if  the 
conjectures  of  Schwartz  be  adopted.  He  supposes  that  we  may 
have  here  the  traces  of  a  popular  superstition  that  the  reflowering 
of  a  certain  dead  fig  tree  in  or  near  Jerusalem  would  be  the  signal 
of  the  coming  of  Messiah.  Hence  the  choice  of  the  fig  tree  for  s 
remark  for  which  any  tree,  or  all  trees,  would  do  as  well.  The 
mention  of  summer  instead  of  spring  may  also  mean  that  the 
Messianic  harvest  is  nigh.  (The  story  of  the  barren  fig  tree  may 
also  find  its  explanation  from  this  supposed  superstition.) 

J.  Weiss  admits  that  there  is  a  certain  contradiction  between 
29,  which  says  that  one  can  foretell  the  coming  from  certain 
signs,  and  Luke  xvii.  20,  where  it  says  that  the  Kingdom  will 
not  come  by  '  observation.'  And  again  there  is  a  contradiction 
between  30  and  32:  for  in  30  it  says  that  the  coming  shall  be 
before  this  generation  is  all  dead,  and  in  32  it  says  that  not  even 
the  Son  knows  the  hour.  Both  points  of  view  were  current 
in  the  oldest  Church,  and,  perhaps  even,  both  were  combined 
or  side  by  side  in  the  mind  of  Jesus.  Signs  were  important,  and 
yet  not  too  important.  Too  much  stress  must  not  be  laid  upon 
them.  In  the  last  resort  the  precise  hour  was  unknown  and  un- 
knowable. Though  the  coming  may  be  expected  before  all  '  this 
generation '  die,  yet  the  exact  h'our  is  nob  foretellable.  £771)5 
iariv.  Who  or  what  is  near?  Probably  the  appearance  of  the 
Messiah,  the  Son  of  man. 


XIII.  1-37]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  307 

30i  Though  the  coming  of  Christ  is  delayed,  it  will  happen 
before  the  '  generation '  of  the  writer  has  perished — i.e.  before  all 
human  beings  then  living  have  died — within,  at  the  most,  100 
years.     A  perilous  prediction ! 

31.  'Jamais  le  Christ  de  I'histoire  n'aurait  dit:  le  ciel  et  la 
terre  passeront,  mes  paroles  ne  passeront  point'  (E.  S.  l.  p.  99). 
The  'words'  are  either  the  words  of  the  apocalypse,  or,  as  W. 
thinks,  the  words  of  Jesus  as  a  whole.     But  this  seems  less  likely. 

32.  It  is  probable  that  this  verse  did  not  originally  belong  to  the 
apocalyptic  discourse  which  ends  appropriately  with  31.  Histori- 
cally, on  the  other  hand,  it  is  reasonable  enough  that  Jesus  should 
have  foretold  that  the  Kingdom  was  very  near,  that  it  would  come 
suddenly,  but  that  only  the  Father  knew  the  exact  hour.  For 
here  all  signs  and  reckonings  are  abandoned.  Nobody  knows, 
except  God.  Here  only,  in  Mark,  are  'Son'  and  'Father'  used  in 
this  specifically  Christian  sense  (cp.  Matt.  xi.  27).  This  is  a 
verse  of  great  importance.  It  is  possible  that  it  is  a  genuine 
fragment,  at  least  in  part,  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  himself  Jesus 
always  proclaimed  that  the  End  was  near,  but  it  is  reasonable 
enough  that  he  should  have  said  that  the  exact  moment — the  day 
or  hour  of  its  coming — was  only  known  to  God.  There  was  all  the 
more  reason  to  be  and  keep  ready,  for  the  Kingdom  would  come 
suddenly  and  unexpectedly.  It  is  possible,  as  Loisy  thinks,  that 
the  words  ovSe  01  ayyeKoi  iv  ovpava>,  ovBe  o  uto?  ('  not  even  the 
angels  in  heaven,  not  even  the  Son')  are  a  gloss.  Then  Jesus 
would  have  said :  '  The  day  and  hour  none  knows  except  the 
Father.'  '  In  the  form  given  to  it  by  Mark,  the  declaration  seems 
to  indicate  an  apologetic  intention,  as  if  it  were  desired  to  justify 
Christ  for  not  having  stated  the  time  of  a  coming  which  was  seen 
to  be  delayed,  by  alleging  that,  according  to  Jesus  himself,  it  was 
a  point  about  which  the  angels  were  in  ignorance,  and  about 
which  the  Messiah  might  very  well  be  ignorant  also.  In  the 
circumstances  of  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  the  simple  assertion 
of  the  Father's  secret  would  have  been  sufficient,  and  the  absolute 
use  of  the  word  Son  to  designate  the  Saviour  belongs  neither  to 
the  language  of  Jesus  nor  to  that  of  the  primitive  gospel  tradition. 
If  it  has  not  been  added  by  the  Evangelist,  then  the  whole  verse 
falls  under  suspicion.  In  any  case,  Mark  has  done  nothing  but 
emphasise  an  idea  expressed  by  Jesus  himself  {E.  8.  il.  p.  438)- 

33-37.  For  the  origin  of  the  passage  see  the  note  at  the 
beginning  of  the  chapter.  These  five  verses  draw  the  moral  of 
32.  Jesus  will  come  again,  though  none  can  say  when.  Hence 
let  every  Christian  be  prepared :  neither  impatient  nor  negligent. 


3o8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIII.  1-37 

but  ready.  Let  each  do  his  duty  faithfully,  so  that  none  be 
caught  napping.  The  discourse  began  privately,  but  the  end  is 
obviously  addressed  to  the  whole  Christian  community. 

Is  the  '  doorkeeper '  to  be  pressed  in  the  application  of  the 
parable  ?     Is  he  Peter,  or  the  apostles  ? 

For  'the  cockcrowing'  (3  A.M.),  cp.  xiv.  30.  The  night  is 
divided  into  four  parts  beginning  at  9  P.M.,  midnight,  3  A.M.,  and 
the  dawn.  This  is  the  Eoman  method  of  division  and  may  be 
due  to  the  Evangelist. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

I,  2.    The  Decision  of  the  Priests  and  Scribes 
{Cp.  Matt.  XX vi.  1-5  ;  Luke  xxii.  i,  2) 

1  Now  it  was  two  days  before  the  feast  of  the  passover  and  of 
the  unleavened  bread  :  and  the  chief  priests  and  the  scribes  sought 

2  how  they  might  capture  him  by  craft,  and  put  him  to  death.  Foi 
they  said,  'Not  on  the  festival,  lest  there  be  an  uproar  among  the 
people.' 

The  story  of  the  Passion  is  not  only  told  with  consummate 
distinction  and  beauty,  but  gives  the  impression  of  a  well  ordered 
and  connected  narrative.  Up  to  this  point  the  life  of  Jesus  from 
the  beginning  of  his  Galilaean  ministry  has  only  been  told  in  the 
roughest  outline.  As  we  have  seen,  many  of  the  stories  are 
grouped  together  from  a  non-chronological  point  of  view ;  others 
seem  to  possess  no  true  and  clear  indication  of  place  and  time. 
But  for  the  last  few  days  of  the  life  of  Jesus  all  seems  changed ; 
the  connection  seems  clear  and  good,  one  event  succeeds  in  time 
to  another  and  there  are  no  gaps  unfilled.  We  seem  to  follow 
Jesus  almost  hour  by  hour  from  the  repast  at  the  house  of  Simon 
to  the  morning  of  the  resurrection.  Yet  Loisy  is  probably  right 
in  pointing  out  that  this  good  connection  has  been  artificially 
obtained,  and  that  here  as  elsewhere  we  have,  even  in  Mark, 
to  deal  with  what  he  calls  ' entrecroisement  et  superposition'  of 
traditions.  Many  difificulties  crop  up  when  we  question  the  narra- 
tive more  closely. 

I.  rjv  a  TO  7ra(T%a  koX  to.  d^Vfia  /x6tA  Bvo  rjfi.epa';.  What 
does  this  refer  to  ?  What  is  the  event  which  preceded  by  '  two 
days '  the  festival  of  the  Passover.  In  the  book  as  we  have  it 
now,  the  reference  must  be  to  the  story  of  the  anointment.    This 


XIV.  1, 2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAKE  309 

happened  two  days  before  the  Passover.  But,  as  we  shall  see, 
this  story  is  probably  intercalated.  The  primitive  object  of  the 
date  seems  to  refer  to  something  more  important.  The  machina- 
tions of  the  priests  and  the  Scribes  can  also  not  be  intended. 
For  these  did  not  begin  at  a  special  fixed  time.  As  the  imperfect 
tenses  show,  they  were  going  on  for  some  while :  '  they  were  seeking 
how  to  kill  him.'  Some  have  thought  that  the  reference  is  to 
verse  10.  It  was  two  days  before  the  Passover  that  Judas  went 
to  the  chief  priests.  But  this  too  has  been  shown  by  Loisy  to  be 
unlikely.  His  own  hypothesis  is  that  the  story  of  the  anointment 
has  taken  the  original  place  of  the  Last  Supper.  It  is  this  which 
took  place  two  nights  before  the  Passover  (E.  S.  II.  p.  491). 

But  the  very  meaning  of  the  verse  is  uncertain  and  variously 
explained.  The  natural  meaning  would  appear  to  be  that  the 
beginning  of  the  Passover  was  to  take  place  two  days  after  the 
day  at  which  the  story  has  now  arrived.  Thus,  if  the  first  night 
of  Passover — the  opening  of  the  feast — fell  on  Thursday  evening, 
the  day  where  we  now  are  is  Tuesday ;  if  the  first  night  fell  on 
Friday  evening,  the  day  where  we  now  are  is  Wednesday.  But 
the  phrase  is  in  any  case  an  odd  one.  The  'Passover,'  the  sacrifice 
of  the  Paschal  Lamb,  is  stated  in  Lev.  xxiii.  5  and  6  to  fall  on  the 
fourteenth  day  of  the  month;  the  feast  of  unleavened  bread  on 
the  fifteenth.  The  Passover,  that  is,  was  sacrificed  towards  sun- 
set, the  feast  of  unleavened  bread  began  with  sunset,  of  the  same 
day,  i.e.,  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth.  See  more  on  this  subject 
below. 

That  Jesus  was  crucified  on  a  Friday  seems  pretty  certain. 
Mark  xv.  42  mentions  this  date  almost  casually.  It  is  not  likely 
that  it  was  invented,  A  great  question  in  dispute  is  whether 
this  Friday  was  the  first  day  of  the  Feast  of  Unleavened  Bread  or 
whether  that  first  day  was  Saturday.  The  former  date  is  the 
implication  of  the  Synoptics;  the  latter  the  view  of  the  fourth 
Gospel.  Under  ordinary  circumstances  when  Synoptics  and  fourth 
Gospel  disagree,  there  is  little  hesitation  as  to  which  is  the  more 
historic.  But  in  this  particular  case  there  is  reason  to  hold  that, 
somehow  or  other,  the  fourth  Gospel  has  recorded  accurately,  the 
Synoptics  falsely.  It  is  true  that  the  more  probably  accurate 
date  tits  in  with  the  theology  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  For  Jesus  is 
crucified  on  the  same  day  as  the  Paschal  Lamb  is  killed.  He  is 
in  his  own  person  the  Paschal  Lamb — sacrificed  once  and  for  all, 
and  making  the  observance  of  the  old  Jewish  imperfect  Passover 
superfluous  and  unnecessary.  Hence  we  might  suppose  that  the 
date  was  arranged  to  suit  the  theory.  But  it  would  rather  seem 
as  if  the  right  date  was  maintained  because  it  corresponded  and 
fitted  in  with  the  theory. 


310  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  i,  2 

Mark,  or  at  any  rate  one  of  the  two  traditions  which  he 
followed,  wanted  to  turn  the  'Last  Supper'  which  Jesus  ate  with 
his  disciples  into  a  last  Passover  meal.  Hence  the  probably 
accurate  date,  according  to  which  the  Friday  on  which  Jesus  was 
crucified  was  the  morning  of  the  day  towards  the  sunset  of  which 
the  Passover  was  offered,  was  changed  into  the  probably  inaccurate 
date  according  to  which  Friday  (and  not  Saturday)  was  the  first 
day  of  the  Feast  of  Unleavened  Bread. 

Mark  seems  to  know  this  double  tradition,  for  xiv.  i,  2  would 
at  least  imply  that  the  intention  was  to  get  Jesus  executed  before 
the  Passover  began;  nor  is  it  definitely  said  that  the  intention  was 
not  carried  out.  It  has  even  been  supposed  that  the  fact  that 
Jesus  was  crucified  the  day  before  the  Passover  suggested  the 
explanation  of  the  date  given  in  our  passage. 

To  put  the  crucifixion  on  the  first  day  of  the  Feast  of 
Unleavened  Bread,  or  to  use  common  language  now,  the  first  day 
of  Passover,  causes  great  difficulties.  That  the  trial  should  have 
been  held  upon  the  first  night  of  the  festival  would  have  been  a 
flagrant  violation  of  Jewish  law.  That  the  Romans  would  have 
crucified  Jewish  criminals  upon  the  first  day  of  Passover  is 
extremely  unlikely.  J.  Weiss  thinks  that  he  can  discern  in  the 
'  Passion '  narrative  of  Mark  two  strata  of  narratives,  embodying 
two  traditions,  the  one  older  and  generally  more  authentic,  which 
accepted  the  historic  date  of  the  crucifixion,  the  other  later  and 
less  accurate,  which  adopted  the  wrong  date.  To  the  second 
stratum  he  assigns  xiv.  3-9,  12-25,  ^^^  SS-^S- 

On  the  Johannine  hypothesis,  then,  the  day  of  which  xiv.  I 
speaks  is  Wednesday.  The  Passover  would  begin  on  Friday  at 
even. 

On  the  other  hand,  Holtzmann  supposes  that  the  Greek  phrase 
/lerd  Bvo  rifiepa^  ('  after  two  days ')  can  be  equivalent  to  '  on  the 
next  day.'  In  that  case  the  day  spoken  of  would,  on  the  Johannine 
hypothesis,  be  Thursday.  On  the  Synoptic  hypothesis  it  would  be 
Wednesday.  But '  after  two  days '  probably  does  not  mean  here 
■  on  the  following  day ' :  it  means  that  a  whole  day  lay  in  between 
the  day  of  which  it  speaks  and  the  day  on  which  the  opening  of 
the  festival  fell. 

W.  holds  that  the  day  spoken  of  in  xiv.  i  is  Thursday,  not 
Wednesday.  He  comes  to  this  conclusion  even  though  he  supports 
the  Johannine  hypothesis  of  the  date  of  Jesus's  death,  and  trans- 
lates /iera  hvo  '^/lepa^ '  after  two  days.'  For  Mark  wrote  for  western 
readers.  Hence,  though  for  Jewish  readers  the  first  day  of  Passover 
began  on  Friday  at  sunset,  for  western  readera  the  first  day  was 
Saturday.  Therefore,  if  it  is  said  that  the  Passover  was  'after 
two  days,'  the  day  implied  is  not  Wednesday,  but  Thursday.    But 


XIV.  1, 2]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  31 1 

how  can  this  be  accurate  when  we  have  the  phrase  in  12,  '  on  the 
first  day  of  the  Unleavened  Bread,'  where  the  meaning  clearly 
is  '  the  evening  before  the  first  day '  1  Hence  it  seems  that  the 
day  alluded  to  in  xiv.  i  must  be  Wednesday,  not  Thursday,  which 
seems  also  to  give  more  time  for  10  and  li. 

Strictly  speaking,  the  phrase  'two  days  before  the  Feast  of 
the  Passover  and  the  Unleavened  Bread'  is  a  contradiction  in 
terms.  For  the  Passover  fell  on  the  afternoon  of  the  14th.  The 
Unleavened  Bread  on  the  isth.  Hence  two  days  before  the 
former  would  be  three  days  before  the  latter,  and  two  days 
before  the  second  would  be  one  day  before  the  first.  But  in  view 
of  the  phrase  in  xiv.  12  we  must  assume  that  one  and  the  same 
period  is  alluded  to :  i.e.  the  afternoon  and  evening  of  the  14th. 
If  this  was  Thursday,  then  Tuesday  is  alluded  to,  if  this  was 
Friday,  then  Wednesday  is  alluded  to, 

2.  The  more  obvious  meaning  of  this  verse  is  that  the  Jewish 
authorities  desired  to  get  the  execution  over  before  the  festival. 
They  were  afraid  that  the  popular  teacher  and  reformer  might 
have  many  sympathisers  among  the  people,  who  till  his  arrest  had 
heard  him  gladly.  More  especially,  if  Jerusalem  became  full  of 
festival  pilgrims  from  Galilee  and  elsewhere,  any  attempt  to  put 
Jesus  to  death  might  easily  provoke  a  riot,  in  which  the  priests 
and  Scribes  would  not  escape  the  vengeance  of  the  crowd.  Hence 
it  was  urgent  to  seek  for  some  pretext  by  which  the  inconvenient 
Galilaean  teacher — or,  shall  we  say,  the  aspirant  to  the  Messiah- 
ship  ? — might  be  quickly  got  rid  of.  W.  supposes  that  the  ruling 
priests  waited  on  purpose  till  near  to  the  festival  in  order  that 
the  sentence  might  be  quickly  passed  and  rapidly  executed  by  the 
Roman  governor. 

Another  interpretation  of  the  verse  is  that  the  authorities 
meant  to  let  the  festival  go  by,  and  the  pilgrims  disperse  to  their 
homes,  before  they  acted,  but  that  their  hands  were  forced  by  the 
unexpected  deed  of  Judas  (verses  10  and  1 1).   This  seems  less  likely. 

Brandt's  conclusions  (Die  Evangelische  Geschichte  und  der 
Ursprung  des  Christentums,  1893)  are  more  negative.     He  holds : 

(a)  That  the  Synoptic  date  for  the  crucifixion  is  im- 
possible. Jesus  could  not  have  been  crucified  on  the  first 
day  of  Passover. 

(b)  The  Johannine  date  is  due  to  the  author's  theology, 
and  is  not  necessarily  historical. 

(c)  That  Jesus  was  crucified  on  a  Friday  is  certain. 
The  very  existence  of  the  Christian  Sunday— (the  'third 
day')  on  which  his  resurrection  is  celebrated — proves  that 
the  crucifixion  must  have  taken  place  on  Friday. 


312  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  i,  2 

The  exact  date  of  the  crucifixion  relative  to  the  Passover 
cannot,  Brandt  thinks,  be  now  ascertained.  It  may  have  been 
a  few  days  before  the  festival,  it  may  have  been  a  few  days  after 
it ;  it  may  have  even  been  in  one  of  the  intervening  days  between 
the  first  day  and  the  last.     Brandt  is  possibly  too  negative. 

In  his  deeply  interesting  and  quaintly  written  treatise,  Das 
letzte  Passamahl  Christi  etc.,  Dr  Chwolson  attempts  to  harmonize 
the  Synoptic  and  Johannine  narratives.  Jesus,  he  thinks,  was 
crucified  on  the  fourteenth  of  the  month,  which  fell  on  a  Friday, 
The  first  day  of  the  Feast  of  Unleavened  Bread,  or,  as  we  popu- 
larly call  it,  the  first  day  of  Passover,  synchronized  that  year 
with  the  Sabbath.  So  far  the  date  of  the  fourth  Gospel  is 
right.  But  the  Synoptics  only  contradict  this  date  apparently. 
It  is  usually  argued  that  as  the  Synoptics  state  that  Jesus 
held  a  Paschal  meal  with  his  disciples  on  Thursday  evening, 
they  must  imply  that  he  was  crucified  on  the  first  day  of  the 
festival.  Chwolson  gets  over  this  by  showing  the  probability 
that  when  the  fourteenth  of  the  month  Nisan  fell  on  a  Friday, 
the  Paschal  lamb  was  slain  on  the  Thursday.  In  Leviticus  xxiii 
5  {cp.  Exodus  xii.  6;  Numbers  ix.  3)  it  is  stated  that  the  Passover 
is  to  be  sacrificed  '  between  the  evenings."  In  later  times  this  odd 
expression  was  interpreted  to  mean  in  the  afternoon,  that  is  before 
sunset.  In  earlier  times  Chwolson  shows  that  it  was  taken  to 
mean  the  first  hour  or  two  immediately  after  sunset.  Also,  did 
the  killing  and  washing  of  the  Paschal  Lamb  conflict  with  the 
keeping  of  the  Sabbath  ?  In  later  times  it  was  held  that  it  did 
not  do  so,  but  in  earlier  times  it  was  held,  as  Chwolson  shows,  that 
it  did.  Thus  when  the  fourteenth  of  the  month  fell  on  Friday,  it 
was  not  held  to  be  legitimate  to  kill  the  lambs  on  that  evening, 
and  they  were  killed  and  roasted  on  Thursday  instead.  The 
Paschal  meal  could  be  celebrated  on  the  same  evening  too,  and 
probably  most  Pharisees  did  celebrate  it  then,  although  the  bread 
used  at  such  an  antedated  meal  was  leavened  and  not  unleavened 
bread.  Thus  Jesus  was  crucified  before  the  seven  days'  Festival 
of  Unleavened  Bread  began,  and  yet  he  celebrated  on  Thursday 
evening  the  Paschal  meal  with  his  disciples. 

Another  arrangement  is  suggested  by  Loisy.  Suppose  the 
event  which  occurred  '  two  days  before  the  Passover'  was  the  Last 
Supper.  Suppose  this  was  held  on  a  Thursday,  then  the  Passover 
would  have  been  held  on  a  Saturday  evening.  The  first  day  of 
the  Unleavened  Bread  festival  would  be  Sunday.  This  date  would 
fit  in  neither  with  the  Synoptic  nor  with  the  Johannine  chrono- 
logy, but  it  would  avoid  the  difficulty,  which  Loisy  regards  as 
almost  as  great,  of  the  coincidence  of  the  crucifixion  with  the  day 
on  which  all  the  final  preparations  for  the  Passover  feast  were  made. 


XIV.  3-9]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  313 

Loisy  further  thinks  that  it  is  not  wholly  certain  that  the  day 
of  the  crucifixion  was  Friday.  For  instead  of  the  day  of  the 
resurrection  being  deduced  from  the  Friday,  it  is  possible  that 
Sunday  was  chosen  as  the  day  of  the  resurrection,  and  hence  the 
Friday,  reckoning  backwards,  was  invented  as  the  day  of  the 
crucifixion  {E.  8.  11.  p.  491).  But  probably  Loisy's  extreme 
scepticism  is  unjustified.  It  remains  probable  that  the  crucifixion 
happened  on  a  Friday. 

For  some  further  remarks  upon  the  subject,  see  Additional 
Note  26.  The  main  dates  of  Jesus's  life  and  death  are,  in  any 
case,  fairly  sure.  He  was  bom  before  Herod  the  Great's  death 
(4  B.C.).  John  the  Baptist  preaches  in  28  a.d.  ;  Jesus  may  have 
been  baptized  the  same  year.  He  himself  begins  to  preach,  say, 
early  in  29,  and  is  crucified  in  30.  The  exact  date  may  have 
been  Friday,  April  8th.  The  month  and  day  of  the  year  are 
computed  according  to  an  astronomical  calculation  that  there  was 
a  full  moon  on  Thursday,  April  7th,  and  to  a  tradition  recorded 
by  Clement  of  Alexandria. 

3-9.    The  Anointing  in  Bethany 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  6-13;  Luke  vii.  36-50) 

3  And  while  he  was  at  Bethany  in  the  house  of  Simon  the  leper, 
afi  he  sat  at  table,  there  came  a  woman  having  an  alabaster  cruse 
of  precious  ointment  of  pure  balsam;  and  she  broke  the  cruse, 

4  and  poured  the  balsam  on  his  head.  And  some  were  angry,  saying 
among  themselves,  'Why  has  this  waste  of  ointment  been  com- 

5  mitted  ?  For  it  might  have  been  sold  for  more  than  three  hundred 
pieces  of  silver,  and  have  been  given  to  the  poor.'     And  they  re- 

6  proached  her.     But  Jesus  said,  'Let  her  alone;  why  plague  ye 

7  her  ?  she  has  wrought  a  good  deed  towards  me.  For  ye  have  the 
poor  with  you  always,  and  whensoever  ye  will  ye  may  do  them 

8  good :  but  me  ye  have  not  always.     She  has  done  what  she  could : 

9  she  has  anointed  my  body  beforehand  for  its  burial.  Verily  I  say 
unto  you.  Wherever  the  gospel  shall  be  preached  throughout  the 
■whole  world,  that  which  she  has  done  shall  also  be  spoken  of  in 
her  memory.' 

This  story  is,  in  Luke,  given  a  different  setting,  and  referred 
to  a  much  earlier  date  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  How  much  of  it  is 
historical  is  dubious.  In  the  fourth  Gospel  the  anointing  takes 
place  before  the  entry  into  Jerusalem ;  J.  Weiss  thinks  this  date 


314  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  3-9 

is  more  probable.  Here  the  story  seems  to  break  the  connection 
between  verse  2  and  verse  10.  It  is,  as  W.  and  others  think, 
'  secondary '  and  late.  If  the  date  '  after  two  days '  referred  to  the 
Last  Supper  which  originally  came  close  after  it,  then  the  place 
(i.e.  Bethany)  assigned  to  the  dinner  (now  the  dinner  of  the 
anointing)  may  also,  in  the  original  document,  have  been  related 
to  the  last  repast  of  Jesus  with  his  disciples  {E.  S.  I.  p.  lOO).  If 
it  was  not  a  Passover  meal,  it  need  not  have  been,  and  probably 
was  not,  held  in  Jerusalem. 

3.  Jesus  is  at  table.  Whether  the  meal  is  in  the  evening  or 
earlier  is  not  stated.  It  may  be  argued  that  we  are  to  assume 
that  Jesus  had  been  in  Jerusalem,  and  had  returned  to  sleep  in 
Bethany.  Simon  the  leper  is  spoken  of  as  if  he  were  well  known. 
There  seems  no  reason  to  doubt  that  he  is  a  historical  character. 
He  is  doubtless  called  the  leper  because  he  had  formerly  been 
leprous,  though  he  now  was  cured. 

The  woman  is  not  named.  The  older  tradition  did  not  know 
her  name.  As  time  went  on,  the  tendency  to  give  names  to  such 
anonymous  persons  grew  stronger.  Hence,  in  the  fourth  Gospel, 
the  woman  is  identified  and  named. 

The  object  of  her  action  is  to  show  Jesus  honour,  and  this  she 
does  by  using  up  all  the  valuable  balsam,  and  even  breaking  the 
vessel  of  alabaster  in  which  it  is  contained. 

4.  'Some'  are  indignant  at  the  waste.  The  MS.  D  turns 
the  'some'  into  the  'disciples,'  which  seems  reasonable.  This 
reading  is  followed  by  Matthev?. 

6-9.  Jesus's  reply.  Whether  any  of  this  reply  is  historical  is 
uncertain.  J.  Weiss  would  wish  to  claim  as  historical  6  and  7. 
Even  in  that  case  we  have  to  assume  that  Jesus  thought  that  his 
death  might  possibly  be  nigh.  By  this  time,  even  though  he 
went  to  Jerusalem  to  triumph  and  not  to  die,  he  may  have  come 
to  realize  that  death  would  be  the  more  probable  issue  of  his 
venture.  He  may  have  said,  '  Me  ye  have  not  always  with  you,' 
with  a  sort  of  wistful  implication  that  the  end  was  not  far  off. 

Whether  historic  or  not,  the  story  is  beautiful,  and  the  words 
of  Jesus  in  6  and  7  are  touching  and  significant.  Special  occasions 
justify  special  actions.  An  act  of  love  and  reverence  may  justify 
exceptional  and  costly  means.  The  teaching  of  6  and  7  supple- 
ments (and  only  apparently  contradicts)  the  teaching  of  Matt.  xxv. 
36-46.  Both  are  justified  in  their  season,  and  we  can  still  in  their 
due  season  make  justified  application  of  both. 

8.  The  first  three  Greek  words  are  not  quite  easy.  '  She  has 
done  what  she  could' — what  it  was  in  her  power  to  do.   As  J.  Weiss 


XIV.  3-9]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDING  TO  MARK  315 

says,  the  words  would  be  suitable  to  a  situation  such  as  that  of  Mark 
xii.  44 :  less  so  here,  for  the  owner  of  the  balsam  is  not  a  poor 
woman  who  gives  her  all.  The  words  are  generally  interpreted  to 
mean  :  she  has  done  what  could  only  then  be  done  and  not  again ; 
i.e.  as  the  next  phrase  explains,  she  has  anticipated  the  anointment 
of  his  corpse,  which  was  attempted  after  his  death,  but  not  carried 
out.  This  interpretation  seems  to  put  into  the  three  Greek  words, 
h  eaxev  iirolrjaev,  more  than  they  can  contain. 

But,  in  any  case,  the  eight  following  words  definitely  make 
the  curious  statement  that  the  woman  by  anticipation  anointed 
his  body  for  burial.  This  may  merely  mean  that  she  has  done  it 
beforehand,  or  inverted  the  order.  But  it  may  also  allude  to,  or 
have  been  coined  because  of,  xvi.  i.  There  three  women  go  early 
on  the  morning  of  the  resurrection  to  the  tomb,  in  order  to  anoint 
the  Master's  dead  body.  But,  as  Jesus  has  already  risen,  they  are 
unable  to  carry  out  their  purpose.  The  anointing  which  the  three 
women  tried  in  vain  then  to  accomplish  had  already  been  done  in 
Bethany  by  anticipation.  It  may,  however,  be  noted  that  the 
Greek  words  are  different.  In  xvi.  i  the  verb  used  is  aXei^eiv. 
The  material  is  dpd>/ji,aTa.  Here  the  verb  is  fivpL^eiv,  and  the 
material  is  fivpou  vdpSov. 

In  either  nuance  of  meaning  the  words  are  inconceivable  in 
Jesus's  mouth.  He  not  only  assumes  his  death,  but  also  his 
burial,  and  nobody  is  astonished. 

As  to  how  far  xiv.  8  and  xvi.  i  are  in  accordance  with  Jewish 
custom,  see  Additional  Note  27. 

9.  The  third  portion  of  Jesus's  speech  also  bears  the  mark  of 
a  later  date.  The  word  '  gospel '  (ei/ayyeXiov)  would  hardly  have 
thus  been  used  by  him.  The  good  tidings  here  clearly  imply  the 
full  story  of  Jesus's  life,  and  sufferings,  and  death.  (At  the  same 
time  the  'proclamation'  or  preaching  is  still  verbal.)  Jesus's 
vehement  assurance  that  the  woman's  deed  shall  always  be  in- 
cluded in  the  gospel  story  awakens  a  suspicion  that  it  was  not 
always  a  part  of  it.  Surely  the  woman's  name  should  have  been 
part  of  her  'memorial,'  and  this  is  omitted  (W.).  Holtzmann 
thinks  that  the  verse  in  its  present  form  may  have  been  enlarged 
and  'edited.'  Perhaps  Jesus  said:  'Her  deed  shall  never  be 
forgotten';  'when  my  story  is  told,  her  deed  shall  always  be 
remembered,'  Thus  do  the  commentators  weave  hypothesis  to 
hypothesis,  and  add  argument  to  argument.  They  play  among 
the  shadows  of  an  irrecoverable  past.  Happy  are  they,  as  to  me 
it  seems,  whose  religion  does  not  depend  too  greatly — happiest  they 
whose  religion  does  not  depend  at  all — upon  the  historic  accuracy 
of  a  miraculous  and  quasi-legendary  narrative,  written  for  purposes 


3i6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSBELS  [XIV.  3-9 

of  edification  or  conversion  by  excitable  and  credulous  men,  to 
whom  the  sovereign  sacredaess  of  historic  fact  was  a  distant  and 
unknown  conception. 

As  to  the  original  meaning  of  the  anointing,  Pfleiderer,  follow- 
ing Van  Manen,  makes  the  suggestion  that  it  was  an  anointing, 
not  for  anticipated  death,  but  for  anticipated  kingship.  The 
woman's  faith  in  the  near  approach  of  the  Messianic  Kingdom 
showed  itself  in  her  thus  anointing  its  king  {Urchristentum,  L 
p.  386). 

10,  II.    The  Betrayal 
(Cp.  Matt,  xxvi,  14-16;  Luke  xxii.  3-6) 

10  And  Judas  Iscariot,  one  of  the  Twelve,  departed  unto  the  chief 

1 1  priests,  to  betray  him  unto  them.  And  when  they  heard  it,  they 
were  glad,  and  promised  to  give  him  money.  And  he  sought  a 
good  opportunity  to  betray  him. 

10.  There  seems  no  good  reason  to  suspect  that  the  action  of 
Judas  Iscariot  is  not  historical.  That  a  disciple  betrayed  the 
Master  would  hardly  have  been  invented  by  legend.  Mark  says 
nothing  of  his  motive.  Much  has  been  conjectured.  Was  he 
disappointed  that  Jesus  did  not  actively  assume  the  Messianic 
rSle  ?  Did  he  want  to  force  his  hand  ?  Had  he  been  a  disciple 
for  a  short  time  only,  and  therefore  misunderstood  the  character 
and  aims  of  the  Master?  Brandt  supposes  that  he  had  only 
joined  Jesus  upon  the  latter's  arrival  in  Judaea  (op.  dt.  pp.  484, 
485).  (Iscariot  is  supposed  to  mean  'the  man  from  Kariot,'  a 
place  already  mentioned  in  Joshua  xv.  25.  W.  thinks  this 
explanation  impossible,  and  that  the  name  has,  so  far,  not  been 
capable  of  explanation.     Cp.  his  note  on  Mark  iii.  19.) 

At  first  sight  it  might  seem  that  no  betrayer  was  necessary, 
for  Jesus  was  by  this  time  well  known  (cp.  verse  48).  But  the 
desire  of  the  authorities  was  to  effect  a  secret  arrest,  and  for  this 
purpose  Judas's  offer  was  convenient  and  timely.  Perhaps  Jesus 
changed  his  night  quarters  on  purpose.  He  may  have  suspected 
what  was  planned.  To  know  where  he  would  be  on  any  particular 
night  some  espionage  or  treachery  was  necessary. 

The  historical  character  of  Judas  Iscariot  is  confirmed  by  the 
further  reflection  that  the  historical  Jesus  would  not  have  wished 
one  of  his  own  disciples  to  betray  him,  and  we  may  safely  assume 
that  he  did  not  foresee  that  he  would  do  so.  The  prediction  of 
18  was  a  natural,  but  later,  growth,  when  an  explanation  was 
needed  for  the  fact  that  Jesus  had  admitted  into  the  inner  ring  of 


XIV.  I2-I6]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  317 

his  disciples  a  man  who  misunderstood  and  betrayed  him.  We 
need  not  interpret  'then/  with  which  Matt.  xxvi.  14  begins,  too 
strictly.  It  is  not  to  be  assumed  that  Judas  had  no  relations  with 
the  authorities  till  that  particular  moment.    (Gp.  E.  S.  11.  p.  501.) 

II.  evKalpwi,  Having  made  his  arrangement  with  the 
authorities,  and  having  received  a  promise  that  his  treachery 
would  be  suitably  rewarded,  Judas  now  seeks  for  a  convenient 
or  opportune  moment  in  which  the  arrest  may  take  place. 


1 2- 1 6.    Preparation  for  the  Passover  Meal 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  17-20;  Luke  xxii.  7-14) 

12  And  on  the  first  day  of  the  unleavened  bread,  when  they  sacrifice 
the  passover,  his  disciples  said  unto  him, '  Whither  wouldst  thou 

13  that  we  go  and  prepare  for  thee  to  eat  the  passover  ?'  And  he  sent 
two  of  his  disciples,  and  said  unto  them,  '  Go  ye  into  the  city,  and 

14  a  man  will  meet  you  bearing  a  pitcher  of  water :  follow  him.  And 
into  whatever  house  he  goes  in,  say  ye  to  the  master  thereof,  The 
Master  says,  Where  is  my  chamber  where  I  may  eat  the  passover 

15  with  my  disciples  ?    And  he  will  show  you  a  large  upper  room, 
i6  furnished  with  couches  and  ready ;  there  prepare  for  us.'    And  his 

disciples  departed,  and  came  into  the  city,  and  found  as  he  had 
said  unto  them:  and  they  prepared  the  passover. 

12.  How  far  is  this  section  historical  ?  W.  rejects  it  alto- 
gether, on  the  ground  (a)  of  its  miraculous  character,  which  is 
like  the  equally  unhistorical  passage  xi.  1-7 ;  (6)  of  its  supposition 
that  Jesus  ate  the  opening  Paschal  meal  with  his  disciples,  whereas, 
according  to  the  fourth  Gospel  and  to  W.,  he  died  before  Passover 
began.  Note  the  curious  parallelism  in  construction  and  wording 
with  xi.  1-4.  Kauch  (Z.  N.  W.  III.  pp.  308-314)  would  regard 
12-17  ^  ^  later  insertion.  Originally  the  passage  18  seq.  was 
a  continuation  of  the  meal  in  Bethany.  That  the  meal  was  the 
Passover  meal  and  that  its  locale  was  Jerusalem  was  a  later  de- 
velopment. 

If  the  Synoptic  date  for  the  crucifixion  be  retained,  one  might 
assume  that  an  arrangement  which  Jesus  had  made  with  a  house- 
holder in  Jerusalem  was  turned  into  a  miraculous  coincidence. 
Menzies  and  others  think  that  Jesus  had  arranged  all  the  details 
beforehand,  even  down  to  the  man  with  the  water  jar  who  was 
to  be  on  the  watch  for  the  despatched  disciples.     The  danger  of 


3l8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  12-16 

arrest  was  great.  The  smaller  the  number  of  those  who  knew 
where  he  was  to  be  the  better.    This  does  not  seem  very  probable. 

J.  Weiss,  who  accepts  the  Johannine  chronology,  thinks  that 
the  passage  may  'hbchstens'  contain  some  recollections  of  the 
room  in  which  Jesus  ate  his  last  evening  meal  with  the  disciples. 
Cp.  as  a  possible  basis  for  the  whole  I  Sam.  x.  2-5. 

'  On  the  first  day  of  the  Unleavened  Bread.'  This  is  a  loose 
expression.  What  is  meant  is:  on  the  day  the  sunset  of  which 
was  the  beginning  of  the  festival.  '  The  first  day  of  Unleavened 
Bread '  would  extend  to  a  Jew  from  sunset  to  sunset.  Chwolson 
assumes  that  the  original  text  has  been  mistranslated.  In  any 
case  what  is  meant  is  clear  enough.  The  Paschal  meal  had  to  be 
eaten,  say,  on  the  evening  of  Thursday.  On  Thursday  morning 
the  disciples  ask  Jesus  where  he  will  eat  it.  The  odd  thing  is 
perhaps  that  no  arrangement  was  made  before  Thursday  morning. 
But  this  detail  need  not  be  accurate.  Chwolson  has  shown  that, 
strictly  speaking,  'the  first  day  of  (the  feast  of)  Unleavened  Bread' 
would  be  the  fifteenth  of  Nisan,  and  could  not  mean  the  fourteenth. 
In  Numbers  xxviii.  16  the  fourteenth  day  is  called  the  Passover; 
the  fifteenth  day  is  said  to  be  a  feast,  on  and  from  which  the  seven 
day  festival  of  Unleavened  Bread  starts.  The  same  phrases  are 
used  in  Leviticus  xxiii.  5  and  6.  Ghwolson's  final  explanation  of 
the  words  in  Mark  and  Matthew  is  that  the  original  Aramaic  ran 
XriDSI  ^/!3p  N0V3.  This  meant, 'on  the  day  before  the  Passover,' 
i.e.  on  the  thirteenth.     But  the  word  *fip  can  also  mean  'first.' 

Hence  the  translators  rendered  '  on  the  first  day  of  the  Passover 
(festival).'  This  reading  is  still  found  in  some  versions  and  MSS. 
It  was  further  altered  to  '  on  the  first  day  of  Unleavened  Bread,'  to 
which  the  words  '  when  they  sacrifice  the  Passover '  were  added  as 
a  gloss  (Chwolson,  p.  1 80  of  his  new  edition). 

Jesus,  against  his  wont,  is  in  the  daytime  not  in  Jerusalem, 
but  goes  there  at  evening  in  order  to  eat  the  Passover. 

1 3.  The  '  man '  is  the  servant  of  the  owner  of  the  house  in 
14.  One  could  hardly  get  into  the  city  without  meeting  (as  Loisy 
observes)  more  than  one  water  carrier,  especially  at  such  a  period 
of  the  year.  The  '  man '  is  known  to  Jesus,  but  not  to  the  disciples. 
'AH  this  is  extremely  vague  and  has  scarcely  the  look  of  a  really 
historical  reminiscence '  {E.  S.  11.  p.  509). 

1 5.  avayaiov,  '  an  upper  chamber ' ;  eaTp{i)fj,ivov,  '  spread  with 
couches,' '  mit  Tischpolstem  belegt '  (B.  Weiss). 


XIV.  17-21]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAKK  319 

17-21.    Prediction  of  the  Betrayal 
(Cp.  Matt,  xxvi,  21-25  ;  Luke  xxii.  21-23) 

,  ig       And  in  the  evening  he  went  thither  with  the  Twelve.    And  as 
they  sat  and  ate,  Jesus  said, '  Verily  I  say  unto  you.  One  of  you 

19  will  betray  me,  who  is  now  eating  with  me.'     And  they  were 
grieved,  and  said  unto  him,  one  after  the  other,  'Surely  not  I?' 

20  And  he  answered  and  said  unto  them, '  One  of  the  Twelve,  who 
2J  dippeth  with  me  into  the  dish.     For  the  Son  of  man  indeed  de- 

parteth,  as  it  is  written  of  him :  but  woe  to  that  man  by  whom 
the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed !  Better  were  it  for  that  man  if  he 
had  never  been  born.' 

17.  The  'Twelve'  is  used  loosely.  Two  were  already  in  the 
city. 

18.  The  two  paragraphs  18-21  and  22-25  both  deal  with  the 
events  of  the  'Last  Supper.'  Note  the  words  'as  they  ate'  repeated 
in  22.  W.  would  distinguish  between  the  two  paragraphs.  The 
second  is  for  him  historical ;  not  the  first. 

How  much  of  the  incident  is  due  to  Psalm  xli.  9  ?  A  critical 
view  of  the  story  can  hardly  allow  a  large  amount  of  historical 
basis.  Even  J.  Weiss  thinks  the  most  we  can  do  is  to  suppose 
that  Jesus  may  have  expressed  some  fear  or  anticipation  that  one 
of  his  disciples  or  friends  would  betray  him.  It  is  improbable,  as 
he  says,  that  Judas,  after  his  visit  to  the  authorities,  returned  to 
close  intercourse  with  Jesus.  He  suddenly  reappears  upon  the 
scene  in  43.  So  too  Loisy.  The  prediction  of  the  betrayal  has 
been  intercalated  in  the  story  of  the  Last  Supper.  It  is  not 
historical  (E.  S.  ii.  p:  515). 

20.  The  reply  of  Jesus  in  this  verse  is  very  peculiar.  The 
Twelve  are  present;  yet  he  does  not  say,  as  in  18,  'One  of  you,' 
but '  One  of  the  Twelve,'  as  if  they  were  not  with  him,  or  as  if  he 
were  not  speaking  to  them.  Is  this  the  effect  of  an  old  tradition 
that  Jesus  had  said  that  one  of  the  Twelve  would  betray  him  ? 

In  the  second  part  of  the  verse  the  words, '  who  dippeth  with 
me  into  the  dish '  is  not  intended  to  refer  specifically  to  Judas. 
It  is  not  implied  that  at  that  very  moment  when  Jesus  was  speak- 
ing Judas  dipped  his  hand  into  the  dish.  Judas  is  not  singled 
out,  for  all  dip  into  the  dish.     It  merely  means  '  one  who  is  dining 


320  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  17-21 

with  me.'  Or  the  words  may  mean  '  one  who  has  lived  in  familiar 
intercourse  with  me '  (cp.  Psalm  xli.  9). 

In  Luke  the  prediction  of  the  betrayal  takes  place  after  the 
communion  scene,  and  the  words  are  still  vaguer :  '  Behold  the 
hand  of  him  who  betray eth  me  is  with  me  at  the  table.'  If  the 
prediction  is  historic,  Luke's  version  seems  the  best. 

The  desire  for  greater  definiteness  is  seen  in  Matthew's  version, 
in  which  Judas  asks  if  he  is  the  betrayer,  and  Jesus  replies  '  Thou 
hast  said,'  which  is  perhaps  equivalent  to  '  Yes.'  The  change  of 
the  participle  from  the  present  (i/jL^airTo/jievos:)  to  the  aorist 
(e/u./Sa-\|ra9)  is  probably  meant  also  to  point  and  single  out  Judas 
('  he  who  has  just  dipped '). 

That  Jesus  should  have  definitely  said  before  the  others  that 
Judas  would  betray  him  is  very  improbable.  Would  Judas  then 
have  been  allowed  freely  to  leave  the  table  (Mark  does  not  record 
his  departure)  and  to  effect  his  purpose  ? 

The  dubious  historical  character  of  the  prediction  of  the 
betrayal  is  emphasised  by  Wrede  in  his  excellent  essay,  Jvdas 
Ischarioth  in  der  urchristlichen  Ueb&rlieferimg.  The  story  he 
thinks  is  a  vaticinium  ex  eventu.  Jesus  is  endowed  with  a  super- 
human insight.  Moreover  Jesus  knows  that  Judas  will  betray 
him,  and  though  he  is  on  his  guard  against  his  enemies,  who 
do  not  know  his  exact  whereabouts  and  quarters,  he  yet  to  the 
last  tolerates  the  traitor  at  his  side.  Is  it  conceivable  that  the 
disciples  could  have  said,  '  Lord,  not  I '  ?  '  An  sich  selbst  konnte 
hier  jeder  Jtinger  zweifellos  am  wenigstens  denken.' 

'  The  dish.'  Most  commentators  say  the  Passover  dish  '  cha- 
roseth,'  that  is,  a  semi-liquid  compound  made  up  of  almonds,  figs, 
dates,  spices,  and  vinegar.  (But  W. — independent  as  usual — says 
it  means  the  gravy  of  the  roasted  lamb.)  The  participators  in 
the  Passover  meal  dip  the  unleavened  bread  and  the  bitter  herbs 
in  this  charoseth  mixture  and  eat  them. 

21.  To  some — e.g.  to  W. — this  verse  is  the  more  suspicious 
and  late  because  the  '  Son  of  man '  twice  occurs  in  it.  To  others 
— e.g.  J.  Weiss — the  words  are  '  very  old,'  and  possibly  were  even 
spoken  by  Jesus  himself.  The  expression  inrdyei  ('goes  away,' 
'  departs ')  is  vague  and  mysterious.  It  is  used  again  in  the  fourth 
Gospel  (vii.  33,  viii.  21,  22). 

What  is  the  Scripture  reference  ?  Is  it  to  Isaiah  liii.  ?  This 
does  not  seem  certain. 

Whatever  the  historical  evidence  of  the  scene  may  be,  its 
solemnity  and  impressiveness  cannot  be  denied. 


XIV.  32-25]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  321 

22-25.    The  Last  Supper 
{Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  26-29;  Luke  xxii.  15-20) 

22  And  while  they  were  eating,  Jesus  took  bread,  and  said  the 
blessing,  and  broke  it,  and  gave  it  to  them,  and  said,  '  Take,  this 

23  is  my  body.'     And  he  took  a  cup,  and  spoke  the  blessing,  and  gave 

24  it  to  them :   and  they  all  drank  of  it.     And  he  said  unto  them, 
'This  is  my  blood   of  the   covenant,  which  is  shed  for  many. 

25  "Verily  I  say  unto  you,  I  shall  not  drink  again  of  the  fruit  of  the 
vine,  until  that  day  when  I  drink  it  new  in  the  kingdom  of  God.' 

These  four  verses  can  be  dealt  with  at  any  conceivable  length. 
To  discuss  them  and  their  parallels  in  the  other  Gospels  and  in 
Paul's  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians  in  full  detail  a  whole  book,  as  big 
as  this  book  and  bigger,  could  easily  be  written.  But  immensely 
important  as  these  verses  are  in  the  history  of  Christian  theology 
— and  indeed  we  might  add,  in  European  history — much  as  they 
have  contributed  to  the  weal  and  woe  of  the  mediaeval  and  modern 
world,  it  is  unnecessary  to  dwell  upon  them  at  any  great  length 
in  a  book  or  commentary  intended  primarily  for  Jewish  readers. 
So  far  as  Jews  are  interested  in  them  from  a  general  point  of  view, 
they  can  read  about  them  in  the  endless  works  of  Christian  theo- 
logians. Jews  will  never  commemorate  the  rite  then  instituted 
by  Jesus,  if  instituted  it  was ;  its  precise  meaning  is  for  them,  as 
Jews,  one  of  very  minor  and  secondary  importance.  It  is  of  pro- 
found importance  and  interest  for  them  to  consider  whether,  and 
how  far,  and  in  what,  the  moral  and  religious  teaching  of  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount  excels  the  teaching  of  the  Old  Testament  and  the 
Rabbis.  What  precisely  Jesus  meant  by  the  words  attributed  to 
him  in  Mark  xiv.  22-25  does  not  greatly  concern  them.  They 
need  no  communion  except  with  God.  They  worship  the  Father 
and  Him  alone,  not  materially  or  by  the  help  of  bread  and  wine, 
but,  to  quote  the  language  of  the  fourth  Gospel,  'in  spirit  and 
truth.' 

The  problems  raised  by  the  four  verses  are  very  numerous,  and 
the  divergence  of  the  commentators  is  extreme. 

To  begin  with,  was  the  Last  Supper  the  Passover  meal? 
Those  who  accept  the  Synoptic  date  for  the  crucifixion  think  that 
it  was;  those  who  reject  this  date,  and  believe  that  the  first  night 
of  Passover  was  on  Friday  and  not  on  Thursday,  think  that  it  was 
not.  In  the  latter  case  it  need  not  necessarily  have  been,  and 
most  probably  was  not,  held  in  Jerusalem.     The  words  of  Mark 


322  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

and  the  words  of  Paul  (i  Cor.  xi.  23-25)  do  not  compel  one  to 
believe  that  it  was  the  Passover  meal.  And  even  if  it  was  the 
Passover  meal,  the  rite  or  actions  mentioned  in  the  four  verses  of 
Mark  seem  to  stand,  or  can  stand,  out  of  close  connection  with  the 
special  rites  of  the  Passover. 

But  whether  the  Last  Supper  was  the  Passover  or  no  is  really 
a  subsidiary  question.  Far  more  important  and  far  more  intricate 
and  perplexing  are  the  questions : 

(a)  What  did  the  words,  as  we  find  them  in  Mark, 
exactly  mean  to  Mark  ? 

(6)  Can  we,  on  the  basis  of  what  Mark  says,  and  of 
what  Paul  says,  a.nd^nf_wViat  T.nke  andnVTattliPW  nijn  draw 
finy_r'>nfllnfiinnR  np  tift  wbnt  ^fmm  jjd  and  agjiL  and  as  to 
what_h|£j3aeaat.J^.what  he  did  andsaid? 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  answer,  at  least  to  the  second  question, 
must  be  exceedingly  problematic.  The  differences  between  Mark 
and  Paul  and  Luke  (in  whom  we  have  to  take  account  of  a  most 
important  variety  of  reading)  are  sufficiently  serious  to  make  it 
doubtful  as  to  what  exactly  Jesus  did.  As  what  he  did  is  doubtful, 
how  can  we  penetrate  with  any  degree  of  certainty  to  what  he  meant 
in  that  which  he  possibly  did  ? 

The  main  points  in  dispute  are,  first,  whether  Jesus  intended 
to  institute  a  rite  to  be  celebrated  after  his  death,  or  whether  he 
did  something,  or  acted  some  symbol,  for  the  sake  of  his  disciples 
then  present,  once  and  for  all.  Secondly,  whether  what  he  did  was 
a  symbolic  rite  of  communion,  or  whether  it  symbolized  the  offering 
or  sacrifice  of  himself  that  he  was  going  to  make  for  the  benefit  of 
his  community  by  his  approaching  death. 

As  to  the  second  question,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the 
conception  of  the  Last  Supper  as  a  symbolic  or  dramatic  repre- 
sentation of  a  sacrifice,  even  if  not  intended  by  Jesus,  was  soon 
ascribed  to  it  and  to  him,  after  his  death.  And  as  such  it  is 
regarded  by  Mark  and  by  Paul.  But  soon  the  rite  was  not  merely 
regarded  as  a  dramatic  symbol  or  representation.  The  bread  and 
wine  were  not  merely  symbols,  but  in  some  mystic  sense  they 
became  that  which  they  symbolized,  at  least  for  those  who  in  faith 
and  purity  received  them.  The  process,  which  culminated  in  the 
full  Roman  doctrine  of  '  transubstantiation,'  began  early.  But  the 
other  idea  of  communion  was  maintained  or  developed,  as  well  as 
that  of  a  sacrifice.  And,  indeed,  the  two  could  pass  into  each 
other.  For  sacrifice  and  communion  to  the  ancient  world  are  two 
aspects  of  the  same  thing.  Moreover  the  mystic  and  sacramental 
idea  of  the  '  elements ' — of  the  bread  and  wine — was  generated  or 
stimulated  by  the   idea  of  communion.     By  means   of  a  joint 


XIV.  22-25]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  323 

participation  in  sacred  food  the  eaters  are  knit  unto  the  god  and 
to  one  another. 

We  may  also  surmise,  with  high  probability,  that  though  the 
words  which  Mark  employs  do  not  definitely  say  that  the  rite  was 
instituted  for  repetition,  still  Mark,  like  Paul,  meant  his  readers 
to  infer,  as  he  himself  believed,  that  it  was.  In  his  days,  when  he 
wrote,  the  ceremonial  was  practised  not  only  as  an  imitation  of 
the  Last  Supper,  but  with  the  idea  that  a  command  of  Jesus,  then 
enjoined,  was  being  faithfully  carried  out. 

It  is,  perhaps,  therefore,  the  more  remarkable  that  Mark,  unlike 
Paul,  says  nothing  about  repetition,  or  as  to  a  rite  instituted 
'for  the  sake  of  remembrance.'  Hence  there  seems,  for  this  reason, 
as  for  others,  much  to  be  said  for  the  view  held  by  W.  and  by 
others,  that  the  rites  mentioned  by  Mark,  as  performed  by  Jesus 
at  the  Last  Supper,  were  intended  to  be  something  done  once  and 
for  all  as  between  himself  and  his  disciples. 

According  to  most  of  those  who  take  this  view,  what  Jesus  did 
was,  in  anticipation  and  expectation  of  his  approaching  death,  to 
celebrate  an  act  of  sacramental  communion  with  his  disciples,  in 
order  that  they  might  hold  together  after  his  death  and  to  some 
extent  supply  his  place.  I  will  quote  a  few  words  from  W.,  in 
which  this  view  of  the  rites  of  the  Last  Supper  is  very  clearly  put 
forward : 

'  The  ancient  idea  (then  still  alive  among  the  Jews)  of  sacra- 
mental union  by  eating  the  same  food  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the 
rite  {cp.  I  Cor.  x.  17).  The  body  of  those  who  have  taken  part  in 
the  same  meal  is  renewed  from  the  same  source,  and  becomes  one 
and  the  same.'  '  The  historic  Last  Supper  had  for  its  motive  the 
near  death  of  Jesus.  It  was  a  special  act  through  which  a  society 
was  founded,  an  act  of  brotherhood  between  the  twelve  disciples, 
in  order  that,  when  their  head  was  gone,  they  might  yet  keep 
together  and  in  a  certain  sense  represent,  and  be  the  substitute 
for,  their  chief  The  making  of  a  covenant  is  effected  once  and 
for  all ;  it  needs,  and  can  tolerate,  no  repetition.' 

By  the  act  of  communion  Jesus  knits  the  disciples  to  one 
another  and  to  him.  He  will  still  be  mystically  and  spiritually 
present  among  them  after  bis  death  till  the  Kingdom  is  established 
and  the  will  of  God  has  been  fulfilled. 

What  remains  to  say  will  best  be  said  in  a  more  detailed  con- 
sideration of  the  words  themselves. 

22.  '  While  they  were  eating.'  Mark  does  not  say  that  the 
rite  was  instituted  at  any  special  portion  of  the  meal.  To  reach 
the  conclusion  that  the  regular  meal  was  finished  (whether  the 
Passover  meal  or  no),  or  that  what  was  now  to  come  was  a  special 


324  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

addendum  or  extra,  one  has  to  make  deductions  and  combinations 
which  are  scarcely  legitimate. 

evXoy^a-ai!,  'said  the  blessing.'  The  word  evxapurrijerai, 
used  for  the  wine  in  the  next  verse,  means  the  same  thing. 
Although  Jesus  had  already  eaten  bread  and  drunk  wine  at  this 
meal,  and  said  the  blessing  over  them,  still,  as  he  was  now  going 
to  use  bread  and. wine  for  a  special  purpose,  he  says  the  blessing 
over  again.  We  need  not  assume  that  we  have  here  to  think  of 
the  special  Passover  blessings  for  bread  and  wine. 

exXaaev,  'broke.'  Tremendous  conflicts  cluster  round  this  word. 
Was  the  breaking  a  mere  detail,  a  mere  necessary  preparation  or 
precedent  for  the  distribution,  or  was  a  symbolism  intended  in 
the  action  of  breaking  ?  Many  think  the  latter.  '  Even  as  I 
break  the  bread,  so  will  my  body  be  broken  by  death.'  This  view 
is  held  by  those  who  think  that  the  rite  symbolized  the  coming 
sacrifice;  but  it  is  not  necessarily  held  by  all  of  them.  The 
breaking  of  the  bread,  says  Holtzmann,  was  '  ein  in  Form  einer 
symbolischen  Handlung  gekleideter  Anschauungsunterricht'  (p.  99). 
But  the  body  of  Jesus  was  not '  broken '  by  the  crucifixion.  Menzies, 
who  adopts  the  view  that  the  rite  symbolized  the  death  of  Christ 
as  his  final  gift  for  the  benefit  of  others,  denies  that  the  'breaking' 
is  a  part  of  this  symbolism.  W.,  in  his  usual  emphatic  style.,  says 
that  the  breaking  is  '  obviously '  (selbstverstandlich)  only  a  prepara-: 
tion  for  its  distribution,  not  a  symbol.  The  wine  was  not  scattered 
(verschiittet)  to  symbolize  the  pouring  forth  (Vergiessung)  of  the 
blood. 

'He  gave  it  to  them.'  These  words  involve  a  further  warm 
dispute.  Did  Jesus  himself  eat  and  drink  ?  Mark  does  not  say 
that  he  did  so,  nor  do  the  other  two  Synoptics,  nor  does  Paul. 
Some  of  those  who  hold  that  the  rite  was  a  symbol  of  his  death, 
think  that  he  did  not  do  so.  Those  who  hold  sacramental  or 
Eoman  views  of  the  bread  and  wine  tend  to  argue  on  this  side. 
The  disciples  eat  of  the  sacrifice ;  they  partake  of  that  which 
symbolizes  it;  he  who  is  to  be  sacrificed  cannot  partake  of  himself. 
Menzies,  though  his  point  of  view  is  quite  different,  yet  strongly 
emphasises  his  conviction  that  Jesus  did  not  eat  or  drink.  '  He 
cannot  drink  of  the  draught  he  has  compared  to  his  own  blood ;  it 
is  a  thing  he  gives ;  it  is  for  others,  nor  for  him.' 

Those  commentators,  on  the  other  hand,  who  see  in  the  rite  a 
communion  between  Jesus  and  his  disciples  are  naturally  keen  to 
argue  that  Jesus  must  himself  have  eaten  and  drunk.  The 
omission  to  say  that  he  did  is  merely  due  to  the  fact  that  his  own 
eating  or  drinking,  as  obvious,  is  assumed  and  taken  for  granted. 
Some  would  see  in  Luke  xxii.  ly,  18,  a  proof  that  Jesus  did  not 
share  in  the  wine  which  he  bade  the  disciples  drink.    W.  calls  this 


XIV.  32-25]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  325 

'eine  unglaubliche  Wortklauberei.'  If  Jesus  did  not  eat  and  drink 
with  the  disciples  '  dann  fiele  die  ganze  Communio  dahin.' 

'  This  is  my  body.'  This  is  the  shortest  formula  as  regards  the 
bread  which  we  possess.  Luke  and  Paul  have  extra  words.  In 
their  brief  and  mysterious  character  we  may  see  reason  to  believe 
that  they  are  authentic. 

What  did  they  mean  to  Jesus  ?  Gould  seems  to  me  justified 
when  he  says  that  to  give  them  any  material  or  semi-material 
or  'realistic'  meaning  is  to  interpret  them  in  violation  of  the 
general  teaching  of  Jesus.  '  It  would  pull  down  all  that  he  had 
been  at  pains  to  set  up  throughout  his  ministry — a  spiritual 
religion.'  The  words  rather  mean  'this  bread  represents  my 
body.'  At  the  most  we  may  assume  the  idea  of  communion 
through  the  common  partaking  of  the  same  food.  Jesus  may  be 
supposed  to  say, '  regard  this  bread  as  my  body,  and  by  eating  it 
let  us  form  one  society,  let  us  be  united  to  each  other;  be  you 
united  to  me.'  Because  Jesus  himself  also  eats  of  the  bread  which 
they  eat,  it  is  as  if  they  had  partaken  of  him  and  become  one  with 
him. 

If  Jesus  alluded  to  his  death  as  a  sacrifice  or  gift  rendered  for 
the  sake  of  others,  we  can  best  interpret  'this  is  my  body,'  as 
■Menzies  interprets  it.  '  Even  as  I  give  you  this  bread,  so  I  shall 
give  up  my  body.'  But  this  does  not  seem  a  very  obvious  idea  or 
obvious  parallelism. 

23.  We  now  come  to  the  second  portion  of  the  rite,  and  are 
at  once, confronted  with  fresh  puzzles  and  difficulties. 

First,  as  to  the  four  last  words  of  the  verse :  'which  is  shed  (or 
poured  out)  for  many.'  W.  regards  them  as  an  addition  to  the 
more  original  remainder.  The  idea  of  communion  is  crossed  by 
them  with  the  idea  of  a  symbolizing  of  the  sacrificial  death. 

There  remains,  then,  if  these  words  are  removed,  the  phrase : 
'this  is  my  blood  of  the  covenant.' 

Now,  J.  Weiss  points  out  that  the  words  'of  the  covenant'  join 
awkwardly  on  to  the  words  'my  blood.'  Hence  the  suspicion  is 
aroused  that  here  too  we  have  an  addition  assimilating  Mark  to 
Paul,  and  that  the  oldest  form  is,  'this  is  my  blood,'  in  close 
parallelism  to  'this  is  my  body.' 

If  so,  then,  to  Mark,  the  meaning  of  the  whole  would  be :  'as 
the  wine  is  poured  forth  from  the  chalice,  so  was  the  blood  (or  life) 
of  Jesus  spilt  as  a  sacrifice.'  The  wine  symbolizes  the  death  of 
Jesus  just  as  the  bread  does. 

But  if  Jesus  spoke  the  first  four  words  (i.e. '  this  is  my  blood '), 
he  meant  by  them  in  all  probability  much  the  same  as  he  meant  by 
'this  is  my  body.'     The  wine,  too,  formed  part  of  the  communion 


326  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

rite.  Because  they  ate  and  drank  what  he  ate  and  drank,  there- 
fore— regarding  the  bread  and  wine  as  symbolizing  liis  body  and 
blood — they  had  become  one  with  him ;  he  had  knit  them  to 
him  by  a  sacramental  bond.  W.  would  keep  '  of  the  covenant.' 
It  is  an  epexegetical  genitive :  my  blood,  which  is  or  forms  the 
covenant. 

This  part  of  the  rite  W.  regards  as  semi-sacrificial.  The  wine 
recalls  the  blood  of  the  sacrifice  by  which  communion  was  origin- 
ally made.  This  seems  to  me  very  doubtful,  as  the  days  in  which 
blood  was  drunk  lay  so  very  far  off.  But  W.  says:  'The  meal  (the 
bread)  sufficed  for  making  a  union.  But  it  is  only  a  shadow  of 
the  old  union  {Verbriiderung)  by  sacrifice.  This  was  done,  not 
merely  through  the  sacrificial  meal,  but  more  solemnly  by  the 
sacrificial  blood,  which  the  participants  applied  to  themselves  in 
the  same  way  as  to  the  god  (i.e.  the  idol  on  the  altar),  by  smearing 
or  sprinkling.  This  sprinkling  was  a  softening  down  of  a  more 
original  drinking.  Another  softening  down  was  the  substitution  of 
red  wine  for  blood.  Wine  is  a  better  means  of  uniting  together 
than  bread ;  it  symbolizes  the  blood,  which  is  more  important  than 
the  flesh,  and  is  regarded  as  the  equivalent  of  the  very  life  itself, 
the  essence  of  what  is  holy  and  divine.  Hence  Jesus  does  not 
combine  the  bread  and  the  wine  in  one  act ;  he  puts  the  stress 
upon  the  wine :   the  sacrifice  is  added  to  the  meal.' 

There  is,  however,  some  reason  to  think  that  the  original  rite 
performed  by  Jesus  was  limited  to  the  bread.  An  important  MS. 
reading  in  Luke,  accepted  by  many  scholars,  and  one  interpreta- 
tion of  that  reading,  would  suggest  that  the  symbolic  act  in  the 
Last  Supper  was  confined  to  the  breaking  and  distributing  of  the 
bread,  and  that  the  wine  was  not  brought  by  Jesus  into  any 
connection  with  his  blood  and  with  his  death.  This  view  is 
supported  by  the  fact  that  in  many  of  the  oldest  Christian  com- 
munities water  was  used  in  the  celebration  of  the  'communion' 
and  not  wine.  Moreover,  this  was  especially  done  in  the  Palestinian 
communities  who  kept  most  closely  to  the  original  ti-aditions  and 
were  least  influenced  by  Paul. 

I  would  also  venture  to  suggest  how  difficult  it  is  for  us  to 
believe  that  a  Palestinian  or  Galilsean  Jew  could  have  suggested 
that  in  drinking  wine  his  disciples  were,  even  symbolically,  drink- 
ing blood.  For  the  horror  with  which  the  drinking  of  blood  was 
regarded  by  the  Jews  is  well  known. 

Taking  the  words  in  Mark  as  we  find  them,  a  reference  to  the 
covenant  of  Exodus  xxiv.  8  is  pretty  clear.  Whether  Jesus  intended 
such  a  reference  is  far  more  doubtful,  even  if  he  spoke  part  of  the 
verse.  But  to  Mark  the  new  covenant  was  to  be  sealed  by  blood, 
even  as  the  old  covenant  which  it  transcends  or  supersedes.    Some 


J  ,i   J  J 


XIV.  22-25]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCOBDING  TO  MARK  327 

such  idea  was  doubtless  ia  the  mind  of  the  writer  of  i  Cor.  xi.  25, 
and  of  our  verse  in  Mark. 

Even  if  Jesus  only  said  'this  is  my  body,'  we  may  hardly 
assume  that  this  communion  ceremony  was  not  performed  by 
Jesus  with  the  feeling,  and  because  of  the  feeling,  that  his  death 
was  nigh.  W.  says :  '  Some  have  doubted  whether  Jesus  was 
conscious  of  his  approaching  death,  and  whether  the  disciples 
could  have  understood  this  background  of  his  action.  But  he 
knew  the  danger  which  threatened  him.  He  passed  the  night 
out  of  doors.  The  scene  at  Gethsemane  is  fundamentally  historic : 
his  fear  of  death,  his  wish  to  avoid  it,  do  not  fit  in  with  the  con- 
ception of  later  writers  that  he  went  to  Jerusalem  with  the  intent 
to  die  there.  That  the  disciples  did  not  realize  the  seriousness  of 
the  situation,  and  that,  therefore,  they  could  not  have  understood 
at  the  moment  the  allusion  at  the  Last  Supper  to  his  death,  must 
be  admitted.  Yet  the  words  which  Jesus  then  said — his  last 
words  to  them  when  together  with  him — would  have  remained  in 
their  minds,  even  though  not  understood,  till  the  very  short  interval 
had  passed  when,  after  his  death,  their  true  significance  was  revealed 
to  them.' 

Thus  W.  argues  that  in  to  alixd  fiov,  if  not  already  in  to  awfid 
fiov,  one  must  admit  a  reference  to  the  imminent  death.  He  adds : 
'Nevertheless  the  two  short  statements  remain  dark  and  mysterious. 
The  only  comparatively  safe  thing  to  do  is  to  set  forth  the  circle  of 
old  ideas  from  which  their  explanation  must  start.  In  that  age  of 
general  religious  ferment  these  old  ideas  were  then  coming  to  fresh 
life  in  various  places.' 

25.  If  Jesus  did  not  himself  drink  when  he  handed  the  cup, 
the  words  must  imply  that  he  had  drunk  before  at  the  meal — the 
usual  Passover  cups,  if  the  supper  was  the  Passover  meal — but 
that  he  would  thenceforth  drink  no  more,  and  so  did  not  drink  of 
the  cup  which  he  now  hands  round  to  his  disciples.  More  prob- 
ably, however,  the  words  imply  that  he  now  drank  again,  and  that 
this  solemn  draught  was  to  be  his  last. 

The  words  in  their  general  sense  are  clear.  Jesus  says  that  he 
will  drink  no  more  till  he  drinks  the  new  wine  in  and  of  the  King- 
dom of  God.  It  is  the  wine  of  Isaiah  xxv.  6.  The  joys  of  the 
Kingdom  are  constantly  referred  to  in  Rabbinical  literature  under 
the  metaphor  of  pleasures  of  food  and  drink.  Jesus  accepts  and 
uses  the  metaphor;  indeed,  we  cannot  be  sure  that  it  was  merely 
a  metaphor  to  him,  for  there  might  be  such  a  thing  in  the  world 
of  the  resurrection  and  of  the  Kingdom  as  a  drinking  which  is  only 
semi-material.  Jesus's  last  words  are  spoken  in  a  tone  of  proud 
confidence  and  joyous  hope,  which  is  very  remarkable. 


328  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

*  Kaiv6v  is  not  the  word  for  new  wine,  for  which  veoy  is  used, 
but  Kaivov  denotes  a  new  kind  of  wine.  In  the  tnaking  of  all 
things  new,  the  dvaKaipwcri'}  (Komans  xii.  2  ;  Titus  iil  S),  there  is 
to  be  a  new  festal  meeting  and  association  of  Christ  and  his 
disciples — a  realization  of  these  earthly  feasts  and  symposia,  which 
are  brought  to  an  end  in  this  Last  Supper '  (Gould). 

Does  Menzies  deduce  from  the  verse  too  much  or  not  when 
he  writes:  'Jesus  knows  that  his  death  is  at  hand,  and  his  drinking 
is  over  for  the  present.  But  he  will  drink  again.  The  separation 
will  be  very  short  to  which  he  is  looking  forward,  and  after  it  he 
will  be  in  the  Kingdom  of  God  where  all  is  new,  the  wine  as  well 
as  other  things.... The  verse  certainly  shows  that  he  looked  for  the 
advent  of  the  Kingdom  to  take  place  at  once ;  his  death  was  to  be 
the  signal  for  its  appearance ;  he  was  to  return  at  once  out  of  the 
realm  of  death  to  take  his  place  in  it  at  the  head  of  those  whom 
by  dying  he  has  enabled  to  enter  it '  ? 

In  its  present  connection,  the  verse  appears  to  indicate  a  two- 
fold conviction  in  the  mind  of  Jesus :  he  is  about  to  die,  but  the 
Kingdom  of  God  will  surely  come,  perhaps  even  is  near  at  hand. 
Though  Jesus  may  have  gone  to  Jerusalem  not  to  die,  but  to 
initiate  the  Kingdom,  he  may  now  have  realized  that  this  was 
not  to  be,  and  that,  even  if  he  was  the  Messiah,  it  was  probably 
God's  will  that  he  should  end  his  earthly  career  by  suffering 
death  at  his  enemies'  hands  :  nevertheless  he  did  not  waver  in  his 
conviction  that  the  Kingdom  was  coming.  By  his  death,  or  in 
spite  of  his  death,  the  Kingdom  would  come.  His  noble  faith  in 
God  was  not  weakened  by  adverse  circumstance. 

W.  lays  great  stress  upon  this  verse.  Whereas  Brandt  does  not 
hold  that  its  words  are  authentic  {op.  cit.  pp.  288-302),  W.  considers 
that  there  is  no  saying  of  Jesus  which  gives  us  more  the  impression 
of  authenticity  than  this  one.  But  why  he  thinks  so  is  because  he 
finds  certain  implications  in  the  saying,  which  are  by  no  means 
obviously  to  be  found  there.  It  is  true,  as  W.  points  out,  that  Jesus 
does  not  speak  of  his  Parousia,  of  his  return  in  power  as  the  Messiah. 
But  is  it  not  going  too  far  to  say  that  he  does  not  represent  himself 
as  the  Messiah  at  all  ?  ('Es  ist  unverkennbar,  dass  er  sich  in  diesem 
Augenblicke  gar  nicht  als  Messias  gibt,  weder  als  gegenwartigen, 
noch  als  zuktinftigen.')  Is  it  not  going  too  far  to  say  that  he  only 
regards  himself  as  one  of  the  guests  at  the  table,  at  which  the 
elect  are  to  sit,  after  the  Kingdom,  without  his  agency  {ohne  sein 
Zutun),  shall  have  come,  and  that  anybody  else  could  have  ex- 
pressed the  hope  that  he  would  take  part  in  the  joys  of  the 
Kingdom  in  precisely  the  same  words?  It  is  true  he  does  not 
speak  of  his  own  special  resurrection  {seine  singuldre  Auferstehung), 
but  is  it  not  going  too  far  when  W.  seems  to  imply  that  this  'most 


XIV.  22-25]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  329 

authentic '  utterance  of  Jesus  shows  that  he  did  not  think  that  he 
had  any  special  part  to  play  either  in  the  Kingdom  itself  when 
established,  or  in  bringing  it  about? 

On  the  assumption  that  W.  and  others  are  right  in  holding 
that  at  the  Last  Supper  Jesus  did  not  institute  a  rite  to  be 
repeated  after  his  death,  but  performed  a  rite  as  between  himself 
and  his  disciples,  once  and  for  all,  it  may  be  asked  how  it  came 
about  that  the  rite  was  perpetuated  and  developed  into  a  solemn 
liturgical  practice  and  ceremony?  Into  this  question  I  cannot 
enter  here.  Sufficient  for  our  purpose  to  say  that  it  is  supposed 
that  the  rite  grew  up  as  it  were  from  a  twofold  stem.  On  the  one 
hand,  it  was  the  custom  of  Jesus  to  share  common  meals  with  his 
disciples ;  he  broke  bread  with  them  habitually.  At  these  meals 
there  may  have  sometimes  been  wine ;  more  usually  only  water. 
This  practice  of  common  meals  was  continued  after  the  Master's 
death,  and  he  was  even  supposed  to  be,  in  a  sort  of  spiritual  sense, 
still  present  among  the  disciples  ('  Die  alte  Tischgemeinschaft  mit 
dem  Meister  wurde  festgehalten.  Das  machte  sich  von  selbst,  er 
hatte  es  nicht  ausdriicklich  beim  letztenmal  befohlen.')  But  the 
second  stem  was  a  conscious  imitation  of  the  Last  Supper  itself, 
with  a  modified  and  more  sacrificial  interpretation  of  the  com- 
munion rite.  An  immense  step  in  the  development  of  the  rite 
must  have  been  given  by  the  teaching  of  Paul.  Into  all  this, 
however,  these  notes  cannot  enter. 

Pfleiderer's  view  is  partly  dependent  upon  his  peculiar  inter- 
pretation of  25.  He  supposes  that  at  the  '  Last  Supper '  Jesus  did 
not  look  forward  to  imminent  death,  but  to  the  near  victory  of  his 
cause  upon  earth  in  his  life-time.  He  will  drink  wine  again ;  not 
at  the  resurrection  and  not  in  heaven,  but  in  the  flesh,  upon  earth, 
when  the  Kingdom  has  been  established.  (This  view  W.  calls  'ein 
schlechter  Spass.')  So,  too,  Pfleiderer  supposes  that  Matt.  xix.  28, 
and  Luke  xxii.  29,  30,  refer  to  a  banquet  and  to  a  dominion,  not 
separated  from  the  time  of  speaking  by  the  death  of  Jesus  and  the 
general  resurrection,  but  to  be  realized  in  the  life-time  of  Master 
and  disciples  alike. 

Hence  Pfleiderer  admits  no  allusion  to  Jesus's  death  in  the 
original  meaning  of  'this  is  my  body.'  He  denies  the  authen- 
ticity of  the  cup  and  of  'this  is  my  blood,'  mainly  upon  the 
ground  that  the  purified  and  oldest  text  of  Luke  knows  nothing  of 
any  sacramental  interpretation  of  the  wine  or  of  its  relation  to  the 
blood  of  Jesus.  (See  the  notes  on  Luke  xxii.  15-20.)  'This  is 
my  body'  meant  to  Jesus:  'by  eating  this  symbol, of  my  body, 
that  is,  of  my  life,  you  are  united  to  me  and  to  one  another,  and 
we  air  become  one  body,  one  inseparable  whole'  {cp.  i  Cor.  x.  17). 
What  Jesus  intended  to  do  '  was  simply  to  make  a  covenant  of 


330  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

friendship  by  the  common  participation  of  religiously  consecrated 
food.'  Jesus  did  not  want  to  make  a  new  covenant  to  replace  the 
old  '  He  did  not  want  to  destroy  Law  and  prophets,  but  to  fulfil 
them.'  The  new  meanings  ascribed  to  the  bread  and  the  wine,  the 
new  covenant,  the  atonement  wrought  by  the  death,  all  these 
things  are  due  to  the  teaching  of  Paul  (  Urchristentum,  I.  pp.  388, 

683). 

Loisy's  commentary  upon  the  Synoptic  Gospels  was  not  pub- 
lished till  the  above  notes  had  been  written.  It  will  be  less 
confusing  if  I  do  not  attempt  to  alter  those  notes,  but  only  add 
here  a  short  statement  of  his  views  which  are  important  and  far 
reaching. 

To  begin  with,  Loisy  holds  that  all  three  Gospels  mean  the 
same  thing  in  spite  of  their  divergencies.  More  particularly  Luke 
in  spite  of  his  difference  of  order,  &c.,  nevertheless  does  not  mean 
anything  different.  The  '  institution  of  the  Last  Supper '  has  the 
same  meaning  to  him  as  to  Mark  and  Matthew  (Loisy  accepts  the 
reading  of  D  as  the  primitive  reading  of  Luke,  i.e.  he  includes 
verse  19  up  to  'my  body'  and  rejects  the  rest  of  19  and  all  20). 

Secondly,  he  holds  that  all  three  go  back  in  idea — ^not 
necessarily  in  language — to  Paul.  To  Paul  the  eucharist,  the 
sacramental  blood  and  wine,  includes  the  notions  of  sacramental 
communion  and  of  the  representation  of  the  Christ's  sacrificial 
death.  The  two  are  closely  and  inseparably  allied.  Just  so  also 
the  brief  words  of  Mark  '  this  is  my  body '  cannot  merely  imply  the 
creation  of  a  sacramental  union  between  the  disciples  and  Jesus. 
They  also  refer  to  his  imminent  death  and  to  that  death  as  a 
sacrifice.  This  is  more  clearly  expressed  in  the  words  about  the 
cup  and  the  blood.  The  breaking  of  the  bread,  and  the  wine  in  the 
cup,  prefigure  and  symbolize  this  sacrifice,  and  though  the  words 
'  do  this  in  recollection  of  me '  are  wanting,  the  Evangelists  none 
the  less  intend  the  acts  of  Jesus  to  be  regarded  as  the  institution 
of  a  liturgical  rite,  commemorating  and  symbolizing  his  sacrifice, 
and  securing  a  perpetual  union  with  him  through  the  eating  of 
bread  and  the  drinking  of  the  wine.  The  faithful  receive  mystically 
his  body  and  blood  and  so  become  one  with  him. 

All  this  is  Pauline  doctrine  and  goes  back  only  to  Paul.  The 
new  covenant  supersedes  the  old  covenant  of  Exodus  xxiv.  8. 

If  Luke  does  not  make  Jesus  say  of  the  wine,  'this  is  my  blood,' 
nevertheless  he  means  the  wine  also  to  be  sacramentally  understood. 
But  from  his  omission  of  the  words  'this  is  my  blood,'  we  may 
infer  that  the  reference  of  the  bread  to  the  body  of  Christ  preceded 
that  of  the  wine  to  his  blood.  Paul  himself  makes  Jesus  say,  not 
'  this  is  my  blood,'  but  '  this  cup  is,'  that  is,  represents,  '  the  new 
covenant  made  in  my  blood.' 


XIV.  22-25]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  331 

Did,  then,  Jesns  say  '  this  is  my  body'  ?  As  Loisy  thinks  that 
the  words  cannot  be  stripped  of  their  Pauline  tenor,  he  is  driven  to 
deny  this.  He  largely  agrees  with  Andersen's  remarkable  article 
in  the  Zeitschrift  der  neutestamentlichen  Wissenschaft  (Vol.  iii.  1902, 
pp.  115-134).  But  there  are  special  indications  which  tend  to  the 
same  conclu.sion.  Note,  in  the  first  place,  the  2Sth  verse  of  Mark's 
14th  chapter.  Contrast  it  with  24.  The  two  belong  to  different 
'  courants  d'id^es,'  and  with  a  little  reflection  one  can  see  that  only 
the  words  of  25  would  have  been  intelligible  to  the  disciples.  The 
words  of  24  only  contain  a  meaning  for  those  who  are  already 
acquainted  with  Paul's  theory  about  the  redemptive  death  of 
Jesus. 

Note,  in  the  second  place,  that  in  Mark  the  words  '  this  is  my 
blood,'  &c.  are  not  said  till  the  disciples  have  drunk  of  the  cup 
(Matthew  transposes  the  order).  But  these  words  should  precede, 
not  succeed  their  drinking.  On  the  other  hand,  the  words  in  25 
rightly  follow  the  distribution  of  the  cup.  Thus  in  the  source 
from  which  Mark  drew  his  narrative  the  statement  in  24  did  not 
occur.  He  added  the  Pauline  words  of  24,  which  he  did  not 
necessarily  take  from  i  Cor.  xi.  25,  but  from  the  eucharistic  rites 
of  the  communities  founded  by  the  apostle. 

Then,  as  to  the  words  'this  is  my  body.'  They  correspond 
with  'this  is  my  blood'  and  must  stand  or  fall  with  them,  even 
though  they  occur  (unlike  'this  is  my  blood')  in  the  true  Luke. 
The  original  for  the  bread  is  similar  to  the  original  for  the  wine. 
As  Jesus  said  of  the  wiae  that  he  would  drink  of  it  no  more  till  he 
drank  it  in  the  Kingdom,  so  he  said  of  the  bread  that  he  would  eat 
of  it  no  more  till  he  ate  it  in  the  Kingdom.  Whether  the  last 
meal  was  the  Passover  or  not  (and  this  Loisy  leaves  an  open 
question),  the  original  saying  about  the  bread  is  more  or  less  pre- 
served in  Luke  xxii.  16  as  the  original  saying  about  the  wine  is 
preserved  in  Mark  xiv.  25.  In  order  to  find  room  for  'this  is  my 
body'  Luke  applied  to  the  entire  meal  words  which  had  originally 
been  said  of  the  bread  alone.     (See  last  paragraph  on  next  page.) 

The  sort  of  isolation  in  which  'this  is  my  blood'  stands  in 
Mark,  and  '  this  is  my  body'  in  Luke,  the  impossibility  of  explain- 
ing them  by  the  context — while  they  are  so  easy  to  understand  in 
Paul — tend  to  show  that  the  body  and  the  blood  have  been 
intercalated  in  a  narrative  where  bread  and  wine  were  only 
mentioned  in  relation  to  the  approaching  Messianic  banquet  and 
Kingdom. 

M.  Loisy  implies  that  even  if  the  words  were  supposed  to  have 
been  merely  '  this  is  my  blood '  and  '  this  is  my  body,'  yet  they 
could  not  be  reasonably  attributed  to  Jesus.  He  does  not  think 
that  they  can  be  limited  in  their  application  to  the  mere  idea  of 


332  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  22-25 

communion  (as  in  W.'s  interpretation),  or  that  the  idea  of  the 
sacrificial  death  can  be  excluded  from  them.  He  holds  that  the 
anticipation  {la  perspective)  of  the  Messianic  banquet  excludes 
the  remembrance  (le  memorial')  of  the  death.  It  was  only  the 
fact  of  that  death  and  the  faith  in  the  risen  Christ  which  inter- 
polated (here  as  elsewhere)  the  mystery  of  the  redeeming  death  in 
the  gospel  of  the  Kingdom  and  '  le  grand  avfenement '  (E.  8.  II. 
p.  540). 

The  real  words  of  Jesus, '  I  shall  not  eat  or  drink  again,'  may 
perhaps  imply  his  death,  but  they  do  not  announce  it.  Like  all 
the  other  authentic  sayings  of  Jesus,  they  maintain  the  point  of 
view  (la  perspective)  of  the  imminent  Messianic  advent.  They 
do  not  imply  that  a  long  time  will  elapse  before  the  Kingdom 
comes ;  nor  do  they  directly  say  that  the  death  of  Jesus  must  first 
intervene.  They  do  imply  that  a  radical  change  is  close  at  hand 
and  that  one  cannot  depend  upon  the  morrow;  to-morrow  the 
expected  Kingdom  will  perhaps  be  there,  but  perhaps,  on  the  other 
hand,  there  will  be  a  terrible  crisis  before  the  Kingdom,  which  is 
nevertheless  near  at  hand,  actually  arrives  (cp.  E.  8.  I.  p.  219). 

How  out  of  the  Last  Supper  as  it  actually  happened  was 
developed  the  institution  of  the  eucharist  is  another  matter,  on 
which  I  need  not  dwell  here.  It  probably  owes  its  origin  (a)  to 
the  historic  common  meals  which  Jesus  was  wont  to  partake  of 
with  his  disciples,  and  (6)  to  the  inventive  genius  of  Paul.  For 
the  common  meals  continued  after  Jesus's  death,  perpetuated  his 
memory,  and  still  united  his  disciples  with  him  who  was  yet  alive, 
and  yet  among  them,  though  invisibly.  Paul  was  the  first  to 
conceive  and  represent  this  common  meal  as  an  institution  which 
commemorates  the  Saviour  who  had  given  up  his  body  and  shed 
his  blood  for  the  salvation  of  the  world,  and  which  had  been 
founded  by  the  will  of  Jesus  himself. 

Andersen  agrees  with  W.  in  omitting  from  the  original  Luke  all 
xxii.  19.  His  view  is  that  the  original  narrative  was  something 
like  this:  'Jesus  spoke  the  blessing,  broke  the  bread,  gave  it  them, 
and  said.  Take,  eat.  For  I  say  to  you,  I  shall  not  again  eat  of  it  till 
it  is  eaten  fresh  in  the  Kingdom  of  God  (i.e.  Luke  xxii.  16).  And 
he  received  the  cup,  and  spoke  the  blessing,  and  said,  Take  this 
and  divide  it  among  you  {i.e.  Luke  xxii.  17).  For  I  say  to  you  that 
I  shall  not  drink  from  this  product  of  the  vine  until  that  day  when 
I  drink  it  new  in  the  Kingdom  of  God '  {i.e.  Mark  xiv.  25).  Upon 
this  basis  Mark's  narrative  was  constructed  and  elaborated. 


XIV.  26-31]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  333 

26-31.    Peteb's  Denial  foretold 
{Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  30-35;   Luke  xxii.  31-34) 

26  And  after  they  had  sung  the  Eallel,  they  went  out  to  the 

27  mount  of  Olives.    And  Jesus  said  unto  them,  '  Ye  will  all  stumble ; 
for  it  is  written,  I  will  smite  the  shepherd,  and  the  sheep  will  be 

28  scattered.     But  after  I  have  risen,  I  will  go  before  you  to  Galilee.' 

29  But  Peter  said  unto  him,  '  Even  if  all  shall  stumble,  yet  will  not  I.' 

30  And  Jesus  said  unto  him, '  Verily  I  say  unto  thee,  This  day,  even 
in  this  night,  before  the  cock  crow  twice,  thou  wilt  deny  me  thrice.' 

31  But  he  spoke  the  more  vehemently,  '  If  I  must  die  with  thee, 
I  will  not  deny  thee.'     So  also  said  they  all. 

26.  Loisy  thinks  that  26  was  'originally'  followed  by  32. 
The  intervening  story  was  made  up  to  show  that  two  events  had 
been  predicted,  namely  Peter's  denial  and  the  flight  or  defection 
of  the  apostles.  Only  the  first  of  these  is  really  described  in  the 
Gospel,  for  xiv.  50  'n'est  qu'une  amorce  pour  le  recit  de  [la] 
dispersion.'  Verse  28  is  inserted  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  story 
of  the  empty  tomb,  a  tale  which  implies  the  presence  of  the 
apostles  in  Jerusalem  the  second  day  after  the  Passion,  in  contra- 
diction to  what  had  been  said  of  their  immediate  dispersion  and 
flight  {E.  S.  I.  p.  100).  What  Loisy  means  is  that  in  the  growth  of 
the  story  of  the  Passion  the  predictions  naturally  represent  a  later 
stratum  than  the  facts  which  are  predicted.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  dispersion  and  flight  of  the  disciples  are  historical:  the  clear 
relation  of  it  has  been  suppressed.  Verse  28  puts  a  new  face 
upon  the  matter.  The  disciples  went  to  Galilee  after  the  dis- 
'covery  of  the  empty  tomb,  in  order  to  obey  the  order  implied  in 
the  prediction. 

The  definite  Passover  meal,  which  had  not  at  any  rate 
been  directly  alluded  to  since  16,  is  now  again  mentioned.  For 
viivriaavrt<s  seem  to  mean  'having  sung  the  "Hallel"  Psalms,' 
i.e.  the  well-known  festival  Psalms  cxiii.-cxviii.,  so  familiar  to 
every  Jew.  These  were  then  sung  at  the  end  of  the  meal.  Jesus 
leaves  the  city  and  goes  out  to  the  Mount  of  Olives.  It  has  been 
thought  that  Bethany  as  his  nightly  quarters  belongs  to  a 
secondary  tradition.  Mark  xi.  19  says  simply  that  he  went  for  the 
night  outside  the  city.  Are  we  to  assume  that  the  particular 
place  whithBr  he  went  on  this  fatal  evening  was  his  usual  nightly 
resting  place  ?  on  the  road  to  Bethany,  but  not  in  Bethany  ?  (so 
Loisy,  E.  8.  11.  p.  546).     Others  suppose,  as  it  was  the  Jewish 


334  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  26-31 

custom  to  pass  the  first  night  of  Passover  in  the  city,  that  Jesus 
went  to  the  Mount  of  Olives  and  not  to  Bethany,  because  the 
Mount  was  technically  regarded  as  within  the  city.  The  question 
is  obscure.  For,  as  we  have  seen,  it  is  doubtful  whether  the  Last 
Supper  was  held  on  the  first  night  of  Passover,  and  not  certain 
that  it  took  place  in  Jerusalem.  ('  Ob  in  der  altesten  Tradition 
der  Ort  der  Abendmahls  Jerusalem  gewesen  ist  lasst  sich  bezwei- 
feln.'    W.) 

27.  Jesus  predicts  the  defection  of  the  disciples.  There  seems 
no  reason  why  he  should  not  have  done  this,  though  of  course  any- 
one can  argue,  if  he  pleases,  that  the  prediction  was  made  up  to 
suit  the  event.  Assuming  that  certain  recollections  of  Peter  were 
one  of  the  sources  of  Mark,  the  words  of  Jesus  in  17-31  may  go 
back  to  the  memory  of  the  disciples  and  of  Peter.  It  is  not  incon- 
ceivable that  Jesus  may  have  felt  that  his  disciples,  however  ready 
to  share  with  him  in  his  ordinary  life  and  in  his  journeys,  were  not 
made  of  adequate  stuff  to  cleave  to  him  if  the  hopes  to  which  they 
clung  were  rudely  shattered,  and  if  he,  whom  they  believed  to  be 
the  Messiah,  should  be  captured  by  his  enemies. 

If  the  opening  words  of  the  verse  are  authentic,  the  quotation 
from  Zechariah  (xiii.  7)  was  added  later.  The  words  are  slightly 
altered  to  suit  the  occasion.     ('  I  will  smite '  for  '  smite.') 

28.  Though  this  verse  can  obviously  not  be  attributed  to 
Jesus  by  any  thoroughly  critical  commentator,  it  is  yet  of  much 
importance.  For  it  seems  to  show,  what  is  confirmed  by  other 
evidence,  that  the  locality  where  Jesus  was  first  seen,  after  his 
death,  by  his  disciples  was  Galilee.  The  verse,  as  Holtzmann  says, 
interrupts  the  connection,  for  29  follows  far  better  immediately 
after  27a.  It  is  wanting  in  the  Fragment  found  in  the  Faijum  in 
Egypt.  Peter  does  not  make  the  slightest  allusion  to  it.  Perhaps, 
however,  it  is  Mark  who  himself  added  the  verse  to  his  source. 

J.  Weiss  has  a  peculiar  view  about  this  verse,  which  is  perhaps 
worth  mentioning,  as  showing  the  endless  possibilities  for  diver- 
gences of  opinion  in  the  interpretation  of  the  Gospel  narratives. 

To  begin  with,  he  denies  that  verse  50  implies  of  necessity  that 
the  disciples  in  their  flight  returned  to  Galilee.  Secondly,  he 
argues  that  verse  28  does  not  say  that  Jesus  will  appear  to  his 
disciples  in  Galilee.  On  the  contrary,  what  the  verse  says  is  that 
Jesus  after  his  resurrection  will  go  before  them  to  Galilee,  and 
Weiss  thinks  we  may  assume  in  addition :  with  the  intention  of 
establishing  or  awaiting  there  the  Kingdom  of  God.  Now,  in  this 
sense,  the  prediction  was  not  fulfilled.  Hence  Weiss  supposes  that 
we  have  here  '  ein  hochst  eigentumliches  und  unerfindbares  Wort 
Jesu,'  from  which  we  can  gather  his  fixed  conviction  that  his  circle 


XIV.  32-42]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO   MARK  3;3^ 

of  disciples,  scattered  by  his  death,  would  be  once  more  collecteijo 
together  by  him  after  his  resurrection,  i 

All  this  seems  improbable.  It  is  more  than  doubtful  whethei, 
Jesus  ever  predicted  his  resurrection,  reappearance,  and  renewed?* 
activity  upon  earth  in  this  definite  sense  and  way.  ', 

29-31.  May  not  this  famous  passage  also  contain  a  historical 
basis  ?  Would  Peter  have  allowed  the  story  to  grow  up  if  there 
were  not  truth  in  it  ?  The  precise  details  and  wording  are  another 
matter.  The  impetuosity  and  eagerness  of  Peter  are  admirably 
drawn,  and  are  perhaps  true  to  his  actual  character.  But  Loisy 
regards  the  whole  prediction  as  unhistoric.  It  was  made  up  after 
the  event,  just  as  the  prediction  of  the  dispersion  of  the  disciples 
as  a  whole. 

30.  'Before  the  cock  crow  twice.'  Only  Mark  (though  not  in  all 
the  MSS.)  speaks  of  two  Growings.  It  is  disputed  whether  there 
was  a  real  cock,  or  whether  the  crowing  had  not  grown  out  of  the 
fact  that  '  cockcrowing '  was  used  as  a  technical  term  to  indicate  a 
particular  hour  in  the  night — 3  ^.M.  In  any  case  the  double 
crowing  is,  as  we  shall  see,  highly  effective  in  the  fulfilment.  The 
meaning  may  be  that  Peter  will  have  denied  his  Master  three 
times  between  the  beginning  and  end  of  the  watch  (3  a.m.- 
6  A.M.) — the  two  Growings  marking  the  two  limits  of  time.  But 
the  source  in  all  probability  spoke  of  only  one  crowing. 

The  writers  of  the  Gospel  maintain  a  splendid  level  of  dignity 
and  pathos  throughout  the  story  of  the  Passion.  (For  Jewish  readers 
is  it  quite  unnecessary  to  add  that  'Passion'  is  used  in  its  older 
sense  of  suffering  ?)  Whether  Mark  xiv.  and  xv.  tell  truth  or 
fiction,  or  whatever  combination  of  the  two,  in  simple  sublimity 
and  exquisite  pathos  they  reach  the  very  highest  rung  of  the 
literary  ladder.     They  are  matchless. 

31.  How  far  may  we  find  in  Peter's  words  Loisy's  interpre- 
tation of  them  ?  '  They  talked  of  dying  with  their  Master,  without 
being  yet  convinced  that  he  had  to  die ;  this  is  what  Mark  intends 
us  to  understand,  while  also  letting  us  divine  that  many  of  them 
did  really  afterwards  die  for  the  Christ'  (E.  S.  11.  p.  550). 

32-42.     Gethsemane 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  36-46 ;  Luke  xxii.  39-46) 

32  And  they  came  to  a  place  which  was  named  Gethsemane :  and 

33  he  said  to  his  disciples, '  Sit  ye  here,  while  I  pray.'     And  he  took 


,,36  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  32-42 

j,,vith  him  Peter  and  James  and  John.  And  he  began  to  be  dis- 
tressed and  troubled,  and  he  said  unto  them, '  My  soul  is  exceeding 
Sorrowful  unto  death :  tarry  ye  here,  and  watch.'  And  he  went 
'forward  a  little,  and  threw  himself  upon  the  ground,  and  prayed 
that,  if  it  were  possible,  the  hour  might  pass  from  him.  And  he 
said,  '  Abba,  Father,  all  things  are  possible  unto  thee ;  take  away 
this  cup  from  me :  nevertheless  not  what  I  will,  but  what  thou 
7  wilt.'    And  he  came  and  found  them  sleeping,  and  said  unto  Peter, 

38  '  Simon,  sleepest  thou  ?  Couldest  not  thou  watch  one  hour?  Watch 
ye  and  pray,  that  ye  come  not  into  temptation.     The  spirit  is 

39  willing,  but  the  flesh  is  weak.'     And  again  he  went  away,  and 

40  prayed,  speaking  the  same  words.  And  he  returned,  and  found 
them  asleep  again,  for  their  eyes  were  heavy ;  and  they  knew  not 

41  what  to  answer  him.  And  he  came  the  third  time,  and  said  unto 
them,  'Sleep  ye  still  and  take  your  rest?  It  is  enough.  The 
hour  is  come ;  behold,  the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed  into  the  hands 

42  of  sinners.  Rise  up,  let  us  go ;  lo,  he  that  betrayeth  me  is  at 
hand.' 

Jesus  is  represented  as  fully  convinced  that  the  hour  of  his 
arrest,  the  beginning  of  the  fatal  End,  is  nigh.  The  narrator 
shows  him  to  us  almost  divinely  prescient,  but  in  a  moment  of 
human  weakness,  turned  by  faith  into  new  strength.  The  details 
of  the  exquisite  story  must  not  be  pressed,  but  it  may  well  have 
a  historic  basis.  For  the  tendency  was  to  turn  Jesus  from  a  man 
into  a  God,  and  a  God  has  no  moments  of  fear  or  agony,  even  if  he 
is  about  to  die.  Thus  the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  omits  the 
scene  altogether;  it  does  not  fit  in  with  his  theology  or  his  con- 
ception of  the  '  divine  word '  made  flesh.  The  disciples  may  have 
seen  that  Jesus  was  wrestling  in  prayer ;  they  may  have  perceived 
that  he  was  in  trepidation  and  sore  mental  distress;  they  may 
have  noticed  that  at  the  moment  of  the  arrest,  before  they  left 
him,  he  alone  was  perfectly  collected  and  calm.  Upon  this  know- 
ledge, the  story,  as  we  have  it  now,  may  have  been  built  up.  Yet 
one  cannot  but  marvel  at  the  wonderful  grace  and  beauty,  the 
exquisite  tact  and  discretion,  which  the  narrative  displays.  There 
is  not  a  word  too  little ;  there  is  not  a  word  too  much. 

32.  Gethsemane  means  ■  oil  press '  or  '  olive  garden.'  Accord- 
ing to  the  fourth  Gospel  this  garden  or  enclosure  was  a  place  to 
which  Jesus  had  often  resorted  with  his  disciples,  and  where  Judas 
would  naturally  seek  him  out. 

Jesus,  saya  W.,  did  not  leave  the  house  in  which   he   had 


XIV.  32-42]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  117. 

supped  merely  in  order  to  pray.     He  feared  arrest,  and  sought  to 
avoid  it  by  passing  the  night  in  the  open  air. 

33,  34.  Three  special  disciples  are  allowed  to  accompany  him. 
Though  he  cannot  depend  upon  them  entirely,  he  does  not  perhaps 
wish  to  be  quite  alone  in  this  dark  hour.  Luke  says  nothing  of 
the  distinction  between  the  three  and  the  other  eight.  Had  Luke 
a  separate  source,  or  did  he,  as  Loisy  thinks,  use  the  source  which 
Mark  himself  had  drawn  upon  ?  In  any  case  the  three  disciples 
are  as  doubtful  here  as  in  the  transfiguration.  The  motive  is  to 
show  that  the  chief  disciples  are  still  without  intelligence.  They 
go  to  sleep.  'The  intention  of  the  Pauline  redactor  is  always 
the  same,  and  that  intention  explains  better  than  the  hypothesis 
of  personal  recollections  the  most  characteristic  peculiarities  in 
Mark's  narrative.'  '  At  the  end  of  the  story,  no  diflference  is  made 
between  the  three  and  the  eleven ;  Jesus,  returning  to  the  three, 
is  found  also  with  the  eleven,  and  is  speaking  to  them  when 
Judas  arrives.  No  more  here  than  elsewhere  does  it  seem 
probable  that  the  redactor  fills  up  with  special  Petrine  recol- 
lections less  precise  data  of  the  general  apostolic  tradition.'  '  Once 
more  and  for  the  last  time  does  he  desire  to  emphasise  the 
dulness  and  apathy  of  even  the  chief  apostles  before  that  mystery 
of  the  Passion,  which  Jesus  in  his  prayer  at  Gethsemane  had 
again  revealed  to  them'  {E.  /S.  I.  p.  loi,  11.  pp.  560,  566).  (The 
feelings  of  Jesus  are  drawn  out  with  great  delicacy  and  charm  by 
Menzies,  in  his  admirable  Commentary ;  it  is  only  on  re-reading  it 
that  one  sometimes  asks :  does  not  its  author  expound  and  know 
too  much  ?) 

Peter  and  the  two  others  see  physical  signs  of  fear  and  distress. 
Moreover,  Jesus  says  to  them, '  My  soul  is  very  grieved,  even  unto 
death.' 

The  word  ir£pL\viro<s  is  used  in  the  Greek  translation  of  Psalms 
xlii.  5,  II,  xliii.  5.  It  is  usually  rendered  'very  sorrowful.' 
Menzies  has  '  in  great  suffering.'  '  Even  unto  death '  is  a  reminis- 
cence of  Jonah  iv.  9.  As  to  the  meaning,  it  is  either,  'I  would 
that  I  were  already  dead,'  i.e.  '  I  would  that  the  awful  experiences 
I  have  to  go  through  were  over,'  or  (J.  Weiss) '  my  grief  is  so  great 
that  I  feel  as  if  death  were  upon  me.' 

The  words  in  which  Jesus's  fear  and  distress  are  depicted  are 
very  strong :  iK6a/jij3ei(r0ai  koI  dSjifioveiv,  '  to  be  full  of  terror 
and  distress,'  is  Dr  Weymouth's  rendering. 

35.  He  had  asked  the  three  disciples  to  wait  and  watch. 
They  were  to  give  him  timely  notice  should  intruders  appear  upon 
the  scene.  Or  perhaps  'he  wanted  them  to  watch  with  him,  to 
share  his  vigil,  not  against  human  foes,  but  against  the  flood  of 

M.  22 


338  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  32-42 

woes  overwhelming  his  soul.  If  possible,  he  would  have  com- 
panionship in  his  extreme  hour'  (Gould),  He  then  goes  a  little 
way  off  from  them  in  order  to  pray.  They  see  him  praying,  but 
then  fall  asleep.  It  is  reasonable  therefore  to  argue,  with  W.  and 
J.  Weiss  and  others,  that  Jesus  went  far  enough  off  to  make  them 
unable  to  hear  what  he  said  even  if  he  prayed  aloud.  Moreover, 
if  they  fell  asleep,  they  would  not  have  heard.  The  words  which 
Mark  gives  are  a  consummately  successful  attempt  to  express  what 
the  situation  demanded — what  the  fear  and  despair  of  Jesus, 
contrasted  with  his  subsequent  calm,  suggest  that  he  must  have 
said  in  his  prayer.  Loisy  notes  that  Luke  starts  and  ends 
with  words  which  Mark  has  only  once  in  38.  With  his  theory 
that  Luke  knew  and  used  the  source  which  Mark  employed, 
he  presses  the  words  and  finds  in  them  the  clue  to  the  prayers 
ascribed  by  Mark  to  Jesus  in  35  and  36.  What  Jesus  said 
to  the  disciples  was,  not,  'pray  that  you  may  not  be  tempted,' 
but,  'pray  that  /  may  not  be  tempted.'  [Luke  has  omitted 
the  fie  (I)  in  xxii.  40,  but  otherwise  has  made  no  change.] 
Apparently,  though  he  is  not  definite  about  this  (but  cp.  E.  S. 
I.  p.  219)  Loisy  regards  this  request  aa  historical.  Jesus  asked 
his  disciples  to  pray,  and  himself  prayed,  that  he  might  not  have 
to  encounter  the  supreme  'temptation'  of  death.  This  is  the 
meaning  of  35,  and  the  words  in  36  repeat  the  same  idea.  The 
cup  is  Pauline,  and  recalls  the  '  cup '  of  the  new  covenant.  '  Not 
what  I  will,  but  what  thou  wilt'  is  based  upon  the  Lord's 
Prayer.  Hence  '  it  was  not  necessary  that  Peter,  James  and  John 
should  have  heard  the  words  in  order  that  Mark  could  have  written 
them'  (JE.S.  11.  p.  562-568). 

36.  aX\!  ov  tI  iyco  6e\eo  dWd  ri  av.  One  must  supply 
riivriuerai,  not  rieveadco,  on  account  of  the  ov.  The  simple  and 
sublime  words  show  prayer  at  its  highest.  '  Not  what  I  will,  but 
what  thou  wilt.'  The  lesson  of  Gethsemane  speaks  to  all  If 
we  learn  from  the  lives  of  heroes,  we  too  have  something  here  to 
learn.  How  cauch  strength  has  the  recollection  of  the  prayer  at 
Gethsemane  given  to  endless  human  souls!  And  why  should  it 
not,  even  though  for  us  Jesus  is  neither  God  nor  Messiah,  give 
strength  to  Jewish  hearts  also?  We  must  restore  this  hero  to 
the  bead-roll  of  our  heroes;  we  must  read  his  story;  we  must 
learn  from  it  and  gain  from  it  all  (and  it  is  not  little)  which  it 
can  give  us  and  teach  us. 

The  'hour'  is  the  hour  of  doom:  the  fixed  and  predestined 
hour;  the  hour  of  crisis  which  was  now  at  hand. 

37.  The  disciples  clearly  are  still  unsuspicious.  Of  course  the 
contrast  is  intended.     Jesus  knows;  they  are  ignorant.     Some 


XIV.  32-42]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  339 

{e.g.  Loisy)  hold  that  the  sleep  of  the  disciples  is  Mark's  creation ; 
others  that  it  is  historic.  But,  as  J.  Weiss  says,  the  conduct  of 
the  disciples  is  unintelligible  and  inconceivable,  if  they  had  already 
been  told  that  within  the  next  few  hours  the  moment  of  crisis 
would  come.  Hence,  though  Jesus  may  have  foretold  to  his 
disciples  that  in  the  hour  of  danger  they  would  desert  him,  he 
cannot  have  said  to  Peter,  'Within  the  next  few  hours  you  will 
deny  me  thrice.'  But  J.  Weiss  holds  fast  to  the  sleep.  He  thinks 
it  was  told  by  Peter,  and  that  Peter  should  have  told  this,  for  him 
discreditable  event,  is  a  proof  of  the  honesty  of  the  tradition. 

38.  If  we  put  aside  Loisy's  explanation  (see  note  on  35),  this 
general  injunction  and  adage  seem  quite  out  of  place.  At  any 
rate,  as  W.  says,  it '  fallt  hier  aus  dem  Ton.'  Perhaps  the  saying 
and  command  were  both  uttered  by  Jesus  upon  another  occasion.' 
As  the  words  stand,  they  may  be  explained  to  mean :  be  vigilant 
and  pray  that  you  do  not  succumb  to  temptation  (which  will  soon 
befall  you).  Sudden  danger,  for  which  men  are  unprepared, 
makes  the  body  unable  to  obey  the  mind  when  the  peril  comes, 
seizes  the  body  and  overawes  the  '  willing '  spirit. 

39.  The  triple  going  and  coming  are  dramatic,  but  scarcely 
historic. 

40.  We  may  compare  this  verse  with  ix.  6.  It  is  a  kind  of 
supernatural  sleep  which  is  portrayed  to  us,  which  it  must  be 
admitted  throws  doubt  upon  its  authenticity. 

41.  There  is  some  doubt  as  to  the  rendering  of  the  opening 
words.  Some  take  them  interrogatively.  'Do  ye  still  sleep  on 
and  take  your  rest  ? '  Others  take  them  ironically :  '  sleep  on 
then,  and  rest.'  Or  they  may  be  taken  to  mean,  '  sleep  on :  it 
now  matters  not ;  I  fear  no  longer ;  I  do  not  need  your  support ; 
I  am  resigned,  and  you  cannot  prevent  the  destined  doom,  which 
is  the  will  of  God.'  to  Xolttov  is  odd  in  any  case.  Some  render 
'  henceforward ' ;  others,  '  now.'  The  words  are  wanting  in  the 
S.S.,  as  also  is  direxec. 

direxei.  The  meaning  is  disputed.  W.,  who  would  bracket 
the  intervening  words  as  secondary,  would  connect  aTrexei  closely 
with  i<yeipecr6e,  i.e.  '  Enough  of  sleep  ;  stand  up.'  B.  Weiss  says  it 
means,  'it  is  enough  :  ye  can  sleep  on  now.'  Jesus  has  conquered 
in  the  arduous  battle;  he  needs  his  disciples  and  their  companion- 
ship no  more.  The  hour  is  come  and  he  is  ready  for  it.  Dr  J.  de 
^waan  (in  Expositor,  1905,  p.  459-472)  has  given  a  new  and 
interesting  explanation  of  diri'x^ei.  He  denies  that  there  is  any 
adequate  evidence  for  the  impersonal  use,  or  for  the  meaning. 


340  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV,  32-42 

sufficit,  'it  is  enough.'  On  the  other  hand,  he  finds  that  in  the 
papyri  the  word  is  often  used  for  acknowledgments  of  money,  where 
it  means, '  I  have  received.'  So  too  here,  Jesus  knows  that  Judas 
is  meditating  his  betrayal ;  he  realizes  that  this  betrayal  will  have 
been  brought  about  for  the  sake  of  money,  and  that  money  will  be 
its  result.  So  now,  when  he  catches  sight  of  Judas  and  his  band, 
he  says :  dtrixei,  '  he  did  receive '  (the  promised  money) ;  he  has 
succumbed  to  the  temptation.  The  subject  of  airix'^i,  is  therefore 
Judas.  Deissmann  seems  to  think  favourably  of  this  interpretation 
{Licht  vom  Osten,  p.  ^6). 

'  The  hour  is  come.'  These  words  W.  would  regard  as 
'  secondary,'  on  account  of  the  use  of  '  Son  of  man.'  The  '  hour '  is 
the  same  as  the  hour  in  35.  J.  Weiss  also  thinks  that  the  sentence 
looks  like  a  sort  of  quotation  from  ix.  31,  or  similar  passages. 

'  Sinners.'  In  what  sense  is  the  word  used  ?  W.  says  '  the 
"sinners"  are,  elsewhere,  the  heathen,  who  do  not  fit  in  here.' 
But  this  is  rash,  for  'sinners'  is  also  used,  as  in  ii.  15  (in  the 
phrase  'tax-collectors  and  sinners'),  of  Jews.  Differing  fi:om 
Menzies,  I  think  that  '  sinners '  is  used  here  to  characterise  those 
who  are  the  enemies  of  the  Messiah. 

42.  The  former  verse  (from  oTrep^et)  possibly,  but  this  one 
certainly,  are  spoken  under  the  consciousness,  whether  through 
sight,  or  sound,  or  both,  that  the  arresting  party  are  at  hand. 
The  speech  becomes  more  agitated.     It  ends  hastily. 

ayco/ji.ei'.  'As  the  hour  has  come,  it  must  be  met  worthily. 
It  must  not  find  the  disciples  lying  on  the  ground,  but  standing 
by  the  Master's  side.  "  Let  us  go,"  does  not  point  to  flight,  but  to 
an  advance  to  meet  the  approaching  party'  (Menzies).  And  J. 
Weiss  says :  '  Jesus  feels  the  presence  of  the  betrayer  even  before 
he  is  there,  and  goes  with  his  disciples  to  meet  him ;  nevertheless 
the  next  verse  begins  as  if  Jesus  were  interrupted  in  his  words  by 
the  approach  of  Judas  and  his  band.'  We  have,  then,  I  suppose, 
to  understand  that  Jesus  sees  or  hears  men  drawing  near ;  he  says 
'  Let  us  go  forth  to  meet  them ' ;  but  hardly  are  the  words  out  of 
his  mouth  before  the  men  are  already  upon  him. 

Loisy  (E.  S- 11.  pp.  569,  570)  supposes  that  the  'historic  tradition,' 
the  source  of  Mark,  only  knew  the  words :  ' Now  rest  and  sleep' — 
a  permission  or  invitation  which  was  cut  short  aud  frustrated  by 
the  arrival  of  Judas.  But  Mark  wanted  to  show  that  the  '  Son  of 
man '  was  not  surprised  by  the  event.  Once  more  he  must  fore- 
tell his  destiny.  'It  is  enough'  is  an  uncertain  and  inadequate 
transition.  Loisy  even  supposes  that  these  words  may  be  an  echo 
of  those  which  Jesus  is  reported  by  Luke  to  have  said  about  the 
swords.     (But  Mark  has  direxei,  Luke  has  'ixavov  iariv.) 


XIV.  43-53 j        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  34 1 

43-52.    The  Arrest 
{Cp.  Matt.  XX vi.  47-56;  Luke  xxii.  47-53) 

'    43        And  immediately,  while  he  yet  spoke,  came  Judas,  one  of  the 
Twelve,  and  with  him  a  band  with  swords  and  bludgeons  from  the 

44  chief  priests  and  the  scribes  and  the  Elders.  Now  the  betrayer 
I         had  given  them  a  token,  saying, '  "Whomsoever  I  kiss,  that  is  he ; 

45  seize  him,  and  lead  him  away  safely.'  So  as  soon  as  he  had  come, 
I  he  went  straightway  up  to  Jesus,  and  said, '  Master ' ;  and  kissed 
,♦6, 47  him.     And  they  laid  their  hands  on  him,  and  seized  him.     But 

one  of  the  bystanders  drew  his  sword,  and  smote  the  servant  of  the 

B    48  high  priest,  and  cut  off  his  ear.     And  Jesus  answered  and  said 

'         unto  them,  'Have  ye  come  out  to  capture  me  with  swords  and 

49  with  bludgeons,  as  if  against  a  thief?    I  was  daily  with  you  in 

ji        the  temple,  teaching,  and  ye  seized  me  not : — but  the  scriptures 

50, 51  must  be  fulfilled.'     Then  they  all  forsook  him,  and  fled.     Yet  a 

young  man  followed  him,  clad  only  in  a  linen  shirt  upon  his  naked 

52  body ;  and  they  seized  him.     But  he  let  the  linen  shirt  slip,  and 

fled  from  them  naked. 

43.  Jesus  is  speaking  to  the  three  disciples,  according  to  the 
strict  interpretation  of  the  narrative,  but  the  local  separation  of 
the  three  from  the  eight  is  now  ignored.  It  is  somewhat  note- 
worthy that  Judas  is  explained  to  be  '  one  of  the  Twelve,'  just  as 
if  nothing  had  been  said  about  him  before.  But  probably  no 
deductions  are  to  be  drawn  from  this. 

Who  form  the  '  crowd '  ?  Not,  it  is  generally  supposed,  Roman 
soldiers  (as  in  John),  and  not  the  regular  Temple  guard,  but  an 
unorganised  band  hired  for  the  occasion.  If  the  arrest  took  place 
the  night  before,  and  not  the  night  of,  the  Passover,  many 
difiBculties  are  avoided. 

44.  The  betrayal  with  a  kiss  is  not  mentioned  by  the  author 
of  the  fourth  Gospel.  It  is  a  little  difficult  that  this  '  sign '  was 
necessary  in  the  case  of  a  man  who  had  been  prominently  teaching 
in  Jerusalem  for  some  while ;  but  it  was  night  time,  and  we  need 
not  suppose  that  Jesus  was  well  known  to  everybody.  'The  sign 
given  by  Judas,'  says  Gould,  'had  nothing  unusual  about  it,  but 
was  the  ordinary  form  of  salute.'  He  adds  :  '  The  motives  of  Judas 
in  this  extraordinary  treachery  are  hard  to  understand.  In 
judging  of  them,  we  have  to  remember  that  he  was  one  of  the 


342  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV,  43-52 

Twelve  chosen  by  Jesns  to  be  his  most  intimate  companions  [there 
may,  however,  be  some  doubt  as  to  the  length  of  time  he  had  been 
with  Jesus],  and  we  must  not  undervalue  that  choice  by  ascribing 
to  Judas  motives  of  such  utter  and  irredeemable  vileness  as  would 
make  him  an  impossible  companion  for  any  decent  person.  It 
may  be  that  he  had  for  his  purpose  in  this  extraordinary  move  to 
force  Jesus  to  assume  the  offensive  against  his  enemies*  This  is, 
at  least,  vastly  more  probable  than  the  mercenary  motive  hinted 
at  in  the  fourth  Gospel,'  The  '  kiss '  is  perhaps  rather  suspicious, 
on  account  of  the  parallels,  2  Sam.  xx.  9 ;  Prov.  xxvii.  6.  On  the 
other  hand  it  may  be  argued  that  44  is  only  the  inference  drawn 
by  Mark  from  the  tradition  of  what  actually  had  occurred. 

46.  In  Mark,  Jesus  says  no  word  to  the  betrayer. 

47.  In  Luke  the  attempt  at  resistance  on  the  part  of  the 
disciples  takes  place  before  the  arrest.  In  Mark  we  have  to 
suppose  that  they  are  so  appalled  and  overcome  by  the  sudden 
onset  of  Judas  and  his  band  that,  till  the  arrest  is  effected,  they 
are  unable  to  make  the  smallest  movement. 

The  words  eh  Se  rt?  twv  •jrapea-TrjKormv, '  one  of  the  bystanders,' 
are  very  peculiar.  So  far  we  have  not  heard  of  any  one  else  being 
present  at  Gethsemane  except  the  Twelve.  But  perhaps  we  must 
keep  the  section  32-42  apart  from  12-31,  and  interpret  the 
'disciples'  of  32  to  mean  more  than  the  Twelve,  or  rather  Eleven. 
Even  then  '  one  of  the  bystanders '  is  odd,  for  one  would  at  least 
expect '  one  of  the  disciples.' 

'  His  sword.'  Thus  some  at  least  of  the  entourage  of  Jesus  are 
armed,  and,  expecting  an  attack  or  onset,  are  prepared  to  resist  it. 
Jesus  does  not  rebuke  the  action  of  the  'bystander.'  (For  a 
further  consideration  of  the  subject  see  the  notes  on  Luke.) 

The  '  servant '  of  the  high  priest  is  probably  the  leader  of  the 
band.  It  is  not  said  that  upon  the  action  of  the  bystander 
reprisals  followed.  Or,  at  the  threat  of  this,  did  the  disciples  flee? 
We  cannot  reproduce  what  exactly  happened. 

48.  The  speech  of  Jesus  is  somewhat  inappropriate  for  such  a 
scene  of  scuflae,  confusion,  and  alarm ;  but  it  is  filled  with  a  quiet 
dignity.  It  is  addressed  rather  to  those  who  sent  the  'crowd' 
than  to  these  men  themselves — to  the  mastera,  not  to  their 
servants.  Luke  seems  to  feel  this,  and  makes  the  autliorities 
present,  which  is  healing  one  inappropriateness  by  creating  another. 

Jesus  implies  that  he  would  have  readily  allowed  himself  to 
have  been  arrested  in  broad  daylight  in  the  Temple.  The  reply 
of  the  authorities  would  presumably  have  been  that  an  arrest  in 
the  city  or  the  Temple  might  have  provoked  from  the  excitable 


XIV.  43-52]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDINa  TO  MARK  343 

populace  effective  resistance  and  riot.  The  swords  of  the  arresting 
troop  were  not  unjustified  in  view  of  the  fact  that  swords  were  not 
absent  among  the  disciples  or  friends  of  Jesus. 

49.  '  Daily.'  The  interval  between  Jesus's  arrival  at  Jerusalem 
and  his  arrest  must  have  been  fairly  lengthy  to  justify  this  ex- 
pression. Mark  himself,  as  we  have  seen,  would  apparently  confine 
the  interval  to  three  days.  If  the  Last  Supper  and  the  arrest 
happened  on  a  Thursday  evening,  Jesus  entered  Jerusalem,  ac- 
cording to  the  Marcan  chronology,  on  Monday  (see  Mark  xi.  11, 
12,  20,  xiv.  3,  17).  Luke  seems  to  have  preserved  the  more 
accurate  tradition  in  xxi.  37,  38. 

'But  [this  has  happened]  in  order  that  the  Scriptures  might  be 
fulfilled';  so  literally.  Two  explanations  are  possible.  Jesus  means 
generally  that  he  resigns  himself  to  the  arrest,  because  his  capture 
and  death  are  part  of  the  divine  will  and  foretold  in  Scripture.  So 
e.g.  Menzies:  'What  Scripture  had  foretold  of  the  death  of  the 
Messiah  had  come  to  pass,  and  so  Jesus  submits  to  the  arrest, 
protesting  against  the  manner  of  it,  but  recognizing  in  the  fact 
itself  the  will  of  God.'  In  this  case  the  7/jo^oi  (Scriptures)  might 
be  Isaiah  liii.  On  the  other  hand,  J.  Weiss  says  that  the  ypa(f>ai 
cannot  be  those  '  which  merely  speak  generally  of  the  death  of 
Messiah.'  The  allusion  must  be  to  passages  in  which  the  special 
manner  of  Jesus's  arrest  seemed  to  be  portrayed.  But  what 
passages  the  Evangelist  had  in  his  mind  we  cannot  tell. 

50.  Whither  they  fled  is  not  stated.  The  general  view  of  the 
commentators  is  that  Mark  implies  that  before  long  they  all 
returned  to  Galilee. 

51,  52.  Only  Mark  has  this  curious  incident.  Who  was  this 
'young  man'?  Brandt  thinks  he  must  have  been  one  of  the 
Twelve.  But  this  seems  extremely  unlikely.  A  popular  idea  at 
present  is  that  it  was  the  Evangelist  Mark  himself.  It  is  often 
supposed  that  Jesus  ate  his  Passover  meal  in  the  house  of  Mark's 
mother  (Acts  xii.  12),  'and  Mark  might  have  followed  the  party 
unseen  when  they  left  for  the  Mount  of  Olives '  (Menzies).  But  it 
is  by  no  means  sure  that  this  Mark  was  the  author  of  our  Gospel. 
And,  again,  it  is  not  sure  that  these  two  verses,  ignored  by  Matthew 
and  Luke,  are  not  a  later  addition.  There  are  also  other  argu- 
ments against  the  suggested  identification,  upon  which  it  is 
unnecessary  to  dwell. 

trwTjKoXovdei.  The  word  is  rather  peculiar,  but  it  occurs  in 
Mark  v.  37,  and  need  not  imply,  as  Brandt  thinks,  that  the  youth 
was  one  of  the  Twelve.  The  term  eh  rt?  veavLaKO<s  seems  intended 
to  exclude  the  disciples. 


344  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  43-52 

He  had  only  a  linen  shirt  on.  Why  was  this  ?  It  does  not 
seem  clear.  Those  who  think  that  he  was  Mark  suppose  that 
when  the  party  broke  up  late,  after  the  Passover  meal,  he  hurriedly 
followed  them  en  ddshabille.  This  seems  very  peculiar  and  un- 
likely. But  if  he  did  not  come  from  the  house  in  which  Jesus  had 
held  the  Last  Supper,  where  did  he  come  from  ?  Was  he  a  work- 
man or  watchman  living  in  some  hut  in  the  olive  garden  ?  (So 
some  older  commentators  quoted  by  Schanz.)  W.  says :  '  The 
young  man  is  undoubtedly  not  one  of  the  Twelve ;  he  seems  to 
have  jumped  out  of  bed  only  after  the  scuflSe  had  begun  as  he  is 
only  clad  with  his  nightshirt.'  But,  one  would  like  to  know,  from 
a  bed  in  what  house?  W.  is  very  severe  upon  the  attempt  to 
ascertain  who  the  young  man  was.  After  pointing  out  that  Mark 
gives  him  no  name,  any  more  than  he  names  the  servant  of  the 
high  priest  or  the  man  who  cut  off  the  servant's  ear,  while  later 
tradition  invented  names  for  the  latter  two,  he  adds  in  his  biting 
way :  '  Christian  Rabbis  have  also  guessed  who  the  young  man  in 
the  shirt  was,  namely  the  Evangelist  Mark  himself.  As  if  they 
were  justified  in  wasting  their  ingenuity !' 

The  peculiarity  of  the  whole  incident  lends  some  little  strength 
to  the  old  hypothesis  that  it  is  due  to  two  passages  in  the  Old 
Testament:  Amos  ii.  16  and  Genesis  xxxix.  12.  M.  Loisy  is 
inclined  to  share  this  view.  How,  he  asks,  could  the  incident  have 
become  known  ?  Did  the  youth  in  his  flight  meet  Peter  and  tell 
him  the  story?  But,  then,  ought  we  not  to  know  more  about 
him  ?  The  Messianic  interpretation  of  Amos  ii.  16  may  have 
suggested  the  entire  incident. 

53-65.    The  Trial  before  the  Sanhedrin 
(Cp.  Matt.  xxvi.  57-67;  Luke  xxii.  54,  55,  63-71) 

53  And  they  led  Jesus  away  to  the  high  priest :  and  all  the  chief 

54  priests  and  the  Elders  and  the  scribes  assembled  together.  And 
Peter  followed  him  at  a  distance  unto  the  court  of  the  high  priest : 
and  he  sat  with  the   servants,  and  warmed  himself  at  the  fire. 

55  And  the  chief  priests  and  all  the  High  Court  sought  for  evidence 

56  against  Jesus,  to  put  him  to  death ;  but  they  found  none.  For 
many  bore  false  witness  against  him,  but  their  evidence  did  not 

57  agree.     Then  some  rose  up,  and  bore  false  witness  against  him, 

58  saying,  '  We  heard  him  say,  I  will  destroy  this  temple  which  is 
made  with  hands,  and  after  three  days  I  will  build  another  made 

59  without  hands.'     But  even  in  this  their  evidence  did  not  agree 


XIV.  53-6s]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  345 

60  Then  the  high  priest  stood  up  among  them,  and  asked  Jesas, 
saying,  'Answerest  thou  nothing  to  that  which  these  bear  witness 

61  against  thee?'  But  he  held  his  peace,  and  answered  nothing. 
Again  the  high  priest  asked  him,  and  said  unto  him,  'Art  thou 

62  the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  the  Blessed  One  ?'  And  Jesus  said, '  I  am : 
and  ye  shall  see  the  Son  of  man  sitting  on  the  right  hand  of  the 

63  Power,  and  coming  with  the  clouds  of  heaven.'  Then  the  high 
priest  rent  his  clothes,  and  said,  '  What  further  need  have  we  of 

64  witnesses  ?  Ye  have  heard  the  blasphemy :  what  think  ye  V  And 
they  all  condemned  him  to  be  guilty  of  death. 

65  And  some  began  to  spit  on  him  [and  to  cover  his  face],  and 
to  strike  him  with  their  fists,  and  to  say  unto  him,  'Prophesy': 
and  the  servants  dealt  him  blows. 

It  is  impossible,  and  for  my  particular  purpose  even  un- 
necessary, to  enter  with  fulness  and  detail  into  the  many  questions 
raised  by  the  trial  of  Jesus — if  trial  it  can  be  called — both  before 
the  Sanhedrin  and  before  Pilate.  So  far  as  Rabbinic  law  throws 
light  upon  the  trial — which  violates  that  law  in  almost  every 
particular — some  remarks  will  be  found  upon  the  subject  in 
Additional  Note  28. 

We  shall  never  be  able  to  tell  or  decide  with  any  certainty 
what  took  place  in  the  high  priest's  house  or  before  Pilate.  We 
shall  never  be  able  to  tell  and  decide  with  certainty  what  share 
the  Jewish,  and  what  share  the  Roman,  authorities  had  in  the 
death  of  Jesus.  A  few  general  observations  may  be  desirable  at 
this  juncture. 

(r)  The  desire  of  the  Evangelists  is  clear — to  increase  the 
share  of  the  Jewish  responsibility  for  the  crucifixion;  to  diminish 
the  share  of  Roman  responsibility.  Pilate  is  whitewashed  as 
much  as  possible;  the  Jewish  authorities  are  condemned.  We 
shall  see  many  indications  of  this  desire  as  we  proceed. 

(2)  It  does  not  follow  because  the  trial  of  Jesus  before  the 
Sanhedrin  or  high  priest  violates  Jewish  law  in  many  important 
points,  that  therefore  the  account  given  of  it  cannot  be  true. 
There  have  been  illegal  trials  at  all  times,  and  even  the  flimsiest 
legal  forms  have  sufficed  to  get  rid  of  an  enemy. 

(3)  The  Jews,  it  is  alleged,  on  the  strength  of  a  dubious 
passage  in  the  Jerusalem  Talmud,  had  been  deprived  for  some 
years  of  the  right  of  putting  a  criminal  to  death.  Hence  it  was 
necessary  to  find  some  decent  pretext,  to  go  through  some  legal 


346  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV,  53-65 

forma,  to  discover  some  suitable  ground,  before  demanding  tbe 
infliction  of  the  death  penalty  from  the  Roman  authority. 

(4)  Not  only,  as  we  shall  see,  is  the  story  of  the  trial  before 
the  Sanhedrin  (and  also  before  Pilate)  very  obscure,  but  it  has  to 
be  remembered  that  no  disciple  of  Jesus  was  present  upon  either 
occasion — certainly  not  upon  the  former.  The  disciples,  those 
who  collected  and  handed  down  the  traditions  about  the  life  and 
death  of  Jesus,  could  only  have  heard  of  what  took  place  at  second 
hand.  J.  Weiss  thinks  there  must  have  been  many  discussions, 
conversations,  questionings  and  arguments  between  friends  and 
foes  of  Jesus  after  his  death  about  the  grounds  of  his  condem- 
nation and  the  details  of  his  trial.  This  indeed  is  not  impossible, 
but  it  is,  of  course,  only  conjecture.  (He  also  thinks  that  Joseph 
of  Arimathsea  may  have  been  present  and  reported,  which  we 
shall  see  is  doubtful.) 

(5)  On  the  whole,  while  the  details  of  the  trials  can  never 
be  ascertained  with  certainty,  the  balance  of  probability  strongly 
inclines  to  the  view  that  the  Gospel  narratives  are  so  far  correct 
in  that  Jesus  was  really  put  to  death  by  the  Romans  at  the 
instance  and  instigation  of  the  Jewish  authorities,  and  more 
especially  of  the  ruling  priesthood.  That  there  was  any  meeting 
of  the  full  Sanhedrin  is  most  doubtful ;  doubtful  also  is  the  part 
played  by  the  '  Scribes '  and  Pharisees ;  but  that  the  Sadducean 
priesthood  was  at  the  bottom  of  the  arrest  and  of  the  '  trial,'  and 
that  the  result  of  this  '  trial '  was  adequate  to  obtain  a  condem- 
nation from  Pilate,  cannot  reasonably  be  doubted. 

As  to  the  internal  government  of  Jerusalem  and  Judaea  at 
that  time,  and  as  to  the  composition  of  the  Sanhedrin,  see  Ad- 
ditional Note  29. 

53.  Mark  does  not  mention  the  name  of  the  high  priest. 
Is  it  because  the  name  was  not  mentioned  in  his  source  'ou  le 
role  du  grand  pretre  n'avait  aucun  relief?  {E.  8.  Ii.  p.  593). 
Difficulties  begin  at  once.  How  could  the  full  court  be  got 
together  so  rapidly  in  the  middle  of  the  night  ?  Jesus  could 
hardly  have  arrived  at  the  high  priest's  house  much  before 
midnight.  When  was  the  arrest  arranged  ?  Not  many  hours, 
we  may  presume,  before  it  took  place.  It  is  usually  supposed 
that  it  was  only  after  the  Supper  that  Judas  arranged  the  arrest, 
and  obtained  his  troop  from  the  authorities.  Did  they  at  that 
hour  of  night  send  out  messengers  to  summon  the  '  Scribes  and 
chief  priests'  together  that  a  court  might  rapidly  be  constituted? 
Did  they  assume  that  the  arrest  would  be  successful,  and  that 
Jesus  would  be  brought  to  the  high  priest's  house  at  the  very 
hour  when  he  actually  arrived  ? 


XIV.  53-65]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCOEDING  TO  MARK  347 

In  addition  to  the  difficulties,  there  are  the  illegalities.  No 
trial  for  life  might  be  held  at  night,  and  the  court  which  tried 
such  an  offence  was  specially  constituted,  and  consisted  of  twenty- 
three  members,  not  of  the  whole  Sanhedrin, 

Who  are  the  chief  priests  ?  Menzies  observes :  'There  was  but 
one  [high  priest];  but  the  office  appears  to  have  conferred  an 
indelible  character,  and  there  were  always  at  this  period  a  number 
of  men  who,  after  serving  as  high  priests  for  a  time,  and  being 
deposed  by  the  government,  still  busied  themselves  with  public 
affairs  and  exercised  great  influence.'  More  probably  Mark  means 
merely  the  chief  priests  who  constituted  the  main  Jewish  au- 
thority, or  the  priestly  members  of  the  Sanhedrin. 

The  house  of  the  high  priest  was  not  the  right  locale  for  the 
court  to  meet  in.  This  is  another  little  '  irregularity '  to  add  to 
the  account. 

54.  There  seems  no  reason  to  doubt  this  statement.  Thus 
Peter  could  know  nothing  of  what  passed  in  the  room  or  hall 
upstairs.     He  remained  in  the  'court-yard.' 

55.  The  entire  court  is  present,  and  immediately  proceeds  to 
the  trial.  But  the  court  is  both  prosecutor  and  judge — a  further 
'  irregularity.'  In  Luke,  as  we  shall  see,  the  court  does  not  meet 
till  the  morning,  which  J.  Weiss  thinks  is  more  probably  correct. 

The  court  does  not  merely  hear  evidence,  but  looks  for  it.  We 
ask,  how  have  the  witnesses  been  obtained  at  this  hour  of  night  ? 
Where  did  they  spring  from  ?  Were  they  kept  in  constant  at- 
tendance lest  their  evidence  should  be  suddenly  required?  W. 
says,  it  is  true :  '  That  the  witnesses  are  at  hand  in  the  middle  of 
the  night  need  cause  no  difficulty.  Das  Verhbr  war  vorbereitet 
und  die  Sache  hatte  Eile.'  But  though  haste  was  necessary,  that 
the  trial  was  prepared  is  asserted,  but  not  proved.  The  Psalmist 
(xxvii.  12)  says :  '  False  witnesses  are  risen  up  against  me,'  and  in 
such  Old  Testament  passages  the  origin  of  some  of  the  '  witnesses ' 
in  Mark  xiv.  56  may  probably  be  found.  It  was  important  for  the 
early  Church  to  show  that  their  Master  and  Lord  had  been  put  to 
death  upon  a  false  charge,  and  that  no  consistent  evidence  could 
be  found  against  him. 

56.  'The  evidence  did  not  tally,'  as  Menzies  renders  the 
words.  It  would  seem,  as  Holtzmann  says,  that  the  witnesses 
were  examined  separately  with  closed  doors.  But  more  probably 
the  picture  of  the  witnesses  sought  out  by  the  prosecuting  judges, 
but  giving  inconsistent,  and  therefore  obviously  false,  evidence,  is 
rather  imaginary  than  real. 


348  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  53-65 

57.  At  this  point  the  whole  big  question  can  be  raised :  What 
was  the  charge  for  which  Jesus  was  condemned ;  or,  What  was  the 
charge  which  sufficed  for  the  Jewish  authorities  to  salve  their 
consciences  and  to  make  Jesus,  in  their  opinion,  worthy  of  death  ? 
It  does  not  follow  that  the  charge  upon  which  they  were  able  to 
condemn  him  as  a  Jewish  court  was  the  same  as  the  charge  which 
they  brought  against  him  before  Pilate,  but  to  distinguish  between 
the  two  causes  a  difficulty. 

The  narrative  (58)  speaks  of  one  specific  charge  made  by 
witnesses,  and  of  one  point  confessed,  upon  interrogation,  by  Jesus 
himself  (62).  The  condemnation  follows  upon  the  confession,  not 
upon  the  charge  made  by  the  witnesses.  The  confession  is  that 
Jesus  was  the  Messiah;  the  charge  is  that  he  had  foretold  the 
destruction  of  the  Temple.  If  either  or  both  of  these  matters 
furnished  the  pretext  for  his  condemnation,  there  is  the  difficulty 
that  neither  of  them,  according  to  Rabbinic  law,  constituted 
blasphemy. 

W.  takes  the  strong  line  that  the  charge  brought  up  against 
Jesus  which  sufficed  for  his  condemnation  before  the  high  priest, 
was  his  prediction  of  the  fall  of  the  Temple.  Thus  58  is,  in 
substance,  authentic  and  historical;  61  6  and  62  are  interpolations 
and  unhistorical. 

The  statement  of  the  witnesses  in  58  is,  in  substance,  the 
same  as  that  made  by  Jesus  in  xiii.  2,  which  W.  regards  as  most 
authentic  and  original.  It  is  alluded  to  in  xv.  29.  Now  W.  asserts 
that  though  such  a  prediction  may  not  be  blasphemy  according  to 
the  letter  of  the  Mishnah,  yet  it  was  blasphemy  according  to 
Jewish  sentiment  and  opinion  right  away  from  Jeremiah's  days 
(Jer.  xxvi.)  till  the  days  of  Jesus.  For  the  Temple  was  the  seat 
of  God.  To  foretell  its  destruction  was  blasphemous  (cp.  Acts  vi.  13, 
as  regards  the  case  of  Stephen).  Moreover,  W.  points  out  that  in 
Matthew  the  two  witnesses  who  spoke  of  this  prediction  are  not 
definitely  called  false  witnesses,  and  their  evidence  is  not  said  to 
be  inconsistent.  (In  his  '  Notes  on  Matthew,'  however,  W.  has  to 
acknowledge  that  this  argument  is  not  worth  much ;  for  Matthew 
calls  all  the  evidence  false,  and  all  the  witnesses  lying.  The  last 
two  are  included  in  the  general  category.)  That  they  bore  false 
witness,  and  that  their  evidence  did  not  tally,  is  Mark's  judgment, 
not  that  of  the  Sanhedrin.  If  their  evidence  was  inconsistent  and 
false,  why  is  it  separated  from  that  of  the  witnesses  in  56,  and 
treated  differently  by  the  court  ?  Matthew  shows  that  the  text 
of  Mark  has  been  'edited,'  for  in  his  narrative  Mark  xiv.  59  is 
wanting,  and  for  e-\lrevSofiaprvpovv  in  57,  Matthew  has  merely 
elnov.  Hence  W.  asserts  that  'this  blasphemy'  was  the  legal 
'  Todesschuld ' ;  it  was  proved  by  consistent  witnesses,  to  whom  no 


XIV.  53-6s]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  349 

objection  could  be  taken,  and  by  his  silence  Jesus  confirmed  and 
acknowledged  it. 

W.  seems  to  have  come  to  this  opinion,  not  because  he  wants 
to  deny  that  Jesus,  in  one  sense  or  another,  claimed  to  be  the 
Messiah.  For  he  expressly  says  that  he  takes  no  objection  to  the 
contents  of  xv.  2,  in  which  Jesus  seems  to  admit  his  Messiahship 
to  Pilate.  But  he  thinks  it  is  impossible  to  believe  that  the  claim 
to  Messiahship  constituted  blasphemy.  He  says :  '  To  the  Jews  a 
man  who  claimed  to  be  Messiah  was  not  a  criminal,  as  he  was  to 
the  Eomans.  Even  though  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Jesus  at 
the  last  did  give  himself  out  as  the  Messiah,  and  was  for  this 
crucified  by  Pilate,  yet  his  condemnation  by  the  Jewish  authorities 
must  have  had  formally  another  ground.  According  to  Jewish 
ideas  there  was  no  possible  blasphemy  (lag  darin  unmoglich  eine 
Qottesldsterung)  if  a  man  said  he  was  the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  God.' 

Before  this  view  is  criticised,  it  must  be  explained  why,  if  the 
prediction  of  the  Temple's  destruction  was  the  real  blasphemy, 
and  the  real  ground  of  Jesus's  condemnation,  the  Gospel  narrative 
does  not  say  so.  The  reply  is  manifold.  First,  Pilate,  anyway, 
condemned  Jesus  for  claiming  the  Messiahship.  Surely  then  the 
Sanhedrin  had  done  the  same.  Secondly,  the  Messiahship,  when 
Mark  wrote,  was  the  great  difference  between  Jew  and  Christian. 
Jesus  to  the  latter  was  Messiah  and  Son  of  God;  to  the  former 
he  was  not.  Surely  he  had  been  sent  to  his  death  because  the 
Jews  refused  to  recognize  his  Messiahship  and  his  divine  Sonship. 
Thirdly,  we  can  trace  in  the  Gospels  themselves  a  disinclination 
to  allow  that  the  words  attributed  to  Jesus  in  58  contained  any 
truth.  Thus  Mark,  or  an  editor,  speaks  of  the  evidence  as  false 
and  inconsistent  and  Luke  leaves  this  charge  out  altogether.  Just 
because  the  tradition  still  accepted  to  a  large  extent  the  Jewish 
reverence  for  the  Temple,  and  felt  that  an  attack  upon  it  would 
have  given  the  Jewish  authority  the  legal  pretext  they  required, 
did  it,  half  consciously,  half  unconsciously,  seek  to  get  rid  of  this 
historic  ground  of  Jesus's  condemnation  and  to  substitute  for  it 
another. 

As  to  the  form  of  the  prediction,  it  is  probable  that  originally, 
if  the  witnesses  quoted  it,  it  was  nearer  to  what  we  read  in  xiii.  2. 
J.  Weiss  points  out  that  the  evidence  shows  that  the  prophecy  in 
its  literal  sense  was  'unendurable'  to  the  early  Christians.  In 
John  ii.  21  the  temple  to  be  destroyed  is  explained  to  be  Jesus's 
body,  which  is  to  be  destroyed  and  to  rise  again.  Mark  stands 
half  way.  He  interprets  at  any  rate  the  rebuilding  of  the  temple 
spiritually:  the  new  temple  is  the  Christian  Church  (cp.  1  Cor.  iii. 
17  ;  I  Peter  ii.  S).  Weiss  further  points  out  that  it  is  not  said  that 
Jesus  will  build  up  another  temple  within  three  days,  but  after 


350  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  53-65 

three  days ;  that  is,  after  a  short  interval.  The  idea  is  that  the 
building  will,  through  a  divine  miracle,  become  ready  all  at  once ; 
it  will  descend — like  the  new  Jerusalem — from  heaven.  Jesus  in 
all  probability  did  not  eay  that  he  would  destroy  the  Temple.  Its 
destruction  was  part  of  the  divine  judgment,  and  as  God  would 
destroy  the  old  Temple,  so  would  God  create  the  new  one.  Menzies 
takes  a  similar  view. 

W.'s  trenchant  interpretation  of  the  trial,  whereby  the  accuracy 
of  61  6  and  62  are  wholly  rejected,  and  the  entire  weight  is  thrown 
upon  58,  seems  doubtful.  For  we  must  surely  believe  that  the 
Messiahship  claim  was  at  least  ventilated,  and  that  it  was  resolved 
that  Jesus  was  to  be  denounced  to  Pilate  upon  that  ground.  It 
seems  somewhat  rash  in  a  narrative,  the  whole  of  which  is  so  shaky 
and  dubious  as  xiv.  55-64,  to  pin  one's  faith  upon  one  piece,  and 
strenuously  to  reject  another.  Lastly,  though  the  prediction  about 
the  Temple  may  have  been  nearer  blasphemy  than  the  claim  to  be 
Messiah,  still,  on  the  one  hand,  it  was  not  technically  blasphemy 
according  to  Jewish  law,  as  later  codified ;  and,  on  the  other  hand, 
if  '  blasphemy '  could  have  been  stretched  to  suit  the  one  offence, 
it  could  also  have  been  stretched  to  suit  the  other.  The  claim 
to  be  Messiah,  without  any  of  the  ordinary  qualifications  of  a 
Messiah — a  claim  admitted  by  a  solitary  prisoner  in  the  full  power 
of  his  enemies — must  have  seemed  a  presumptuous  insolence,  a 
kind  of  taking  God's  holy  promises  in  vain.  It  could,  perhaps, 
have  been  regarded  as  blasphemy  by  those  who  had  predetermined 
to  put  out  of  the  way  a  man  who  challenged  the  legitimacy  of 
their  authority,  their  claims,  their  rectitude,  and  their  teaching. 
Holtzmann  argues  in  this  strain.  J.  Weiss  thinks  that  the  judges 
would  not  have  ventured  to  pass  a  formal  verdict  of  guilty  of 
death  because  of  blasphemy,  when  no  technical  blasphemy  had 
been  uttered.  Hence  he  supposes  that  there  was  no  regular 
verdict  or  regular  condemnation,  as  mentioned  in  64  ;  but  that 
the  confession  wrung  from  Jesus  that  he  was  the  Messiah  seemed 
enough  to  the  authorities  as  a  basis  upon  which  to  bring  Jesus 
before  Pilate  and  to  demand  his  execution.  Luke  does  not  mention 
a  formal  verdict  and  condemnation.  Something,  too,  may  be  said 
for  the  argument  that  Mark  ii.  7  shows  that  blasphemy  was  an 
elastic  conception,  not  confined  to  the  mere  pronouncement  of 
God's  name  (Yahweh).  There  is  also  force  in  Menzies's  words :  '  If 
the  condemnation  was  illegal,  it  may  have  come  about  in  various 
ways.  A  charge  of  constructive  blasphemy  was  likely  to  be  made 
against  him  by  those  who  were  familiar  with  his  utterances  in 
Galilee,  e.g.  those  as  to  the  forgiveness  of  sins  (said,  ii.  7,  to  be 
blasphemous)  and  as  to  the  Sabbath.  A  condemnation  on  such  a 
charge  lay  within  the  competence  of  the  Sanhedrin,  and  was  likely 


XIV,  53-65]       THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  351 

to  impress  the  mind  of  the  Jews.  It  is  not  unlikely  that  the 
charge  was  blasphemy,  but  the  report  of  the  trial  cannot  be  con- 
sidered full  or  satisfactory.' 

60.  The  high  priest  "stood  up  in  the  midst';  so  literally. 
This  is  usually  taken  to  mean  that  he  got  up,  left  his  seat,  and 
stood  in  front  of  Jesus,    But  the  phrase  may  merely  mean  'got  up,' 

61,  Jesus  makes  no  reply.  This  may  be  quite  historic.  The 
judges  would  not  understand  his  point  of  view,  his  aims,  his  hopes, 
or  his  belief.  But  one  remembers  Isaiah  liii.  7,  and  is  a  little 
doubtful. 

It  is,  no  doubt,  highly  curious,  as  W,  says,  that  the  high  priest 
does  not  say, '  Your  silence  means  a  confession,'  does  not,  in  fact, 
pursue  the  charge  of  58  at  all,  but  raises  a  totally  fresh  question. 

As  to  the  form  of  the  question,  Jewish  readers  must  especially 
notice  that  the  high  priest's  question  does  not  imply  that  the  very 
idea  of  '  the  Son  of  God '  is  itself  a  blasphemy.  It  is  assumed  by 
him  that  the  true  Messiah  would  be  '  the  Son  of  God.'  Nor  was 
Mark  inaccurate  in  making  the  high  priest  use  such  words.  The 
later  metaphysical  and  more  developed  conception  of  the  '  Son  of 
God '  had  not  yet  arisen.  The  Messiah  was  the  Son  of  God ;  in 
the  Messianically  interpreted  second  and  eighty-ninth  Psalms  he 
is  actually  so  called.  In  the  age  of  Jesus  the  purely  human 
character  of  the  Messiah  was  not  insisted  on  by  Jewish  teachers 
as  it  became  insisted  on  after  the  development  of  Christianity. 
Boom  was  given  for  wide  speculations  and  fancies  as  to  his  nature 
and  pre-existence;  he  stood  in  a  special  relation  to  God,  and  was 
in  a  pre-eminent  sense  his  Son.  But,  of  course,  he  was  a  separate 
and  subordinate  being,  distinct  from,  and  created  by,  God.  In  this 
sense  only  does  the  high  priest  speak  of  him  as  God's  Son,  and  only 
in  this  sense  does  Jesus  mean  that  he  is  Son  and  Messiah.  The 
'  Blessed  One '  is  merely  a  circumlocution  for  God.  To  a  Jew,  as 
Loisy  says,  the  phrase  '  Son  of  God '  would  have  implied  no  '  id^e 
metaphysique '  which  he  rightly  and  truly  says  is  more  '  conforme 
h,  I'esprit  de  la  gentility '  than  to  that  of  Judaism.  The  phrase 
would  indeed  be  blasphemous  if  it  implied  the  incarnation  of  a 
being  '  qui  ^tait,  pour  ainsi  dire,  quelque  chose  de  Dieu.'  And 
if  the  scene,  as  Loisy  thinks,  has  been  invented  by  the  Evangelist, 
or  by  Christian  tradition,  then  nothing  is  more  easy  to  explain 
than  that  it  would  have  been  supposed  that  the  Jews  regarded  the 
ascription  of  the  title  by  Jesus  to  himself  as  blasphemy  (K  S.  il. 
p.  604). 

On  the  other  hand,  if  it  was  no  blasphemy  for  the  real  Messiah 
to  be  spoken  of,  and  to  speak  of  himself,  as  the  Son  of  God  in  the 
Jewish  and  contemporary  sense,  it  might  conceivably  be  regarded 


3S2  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  53-65 

as  blasphemy  for  a  man  to  claim  to  be  that  Son,  when  he  was  not. 
J.  Weiss  points  out  that,  when  the  fourth  Gospel  was  written,  the 
Jews  are  said  to  be  indignant  because  Jesus  called  God  his  own 
(iSlov)  Father,  thereby  making  himself  equal  with  God.  And 
when  the  Wisdom  of  Solomon  was  written,  the  wicked  are  said 
to  taunt  the  righteous  man  because  '  he  calls  himself  the  child  of 
God,  he  vaunts  that  God  is  his  father.'  They  urge,  in  words  which 
seem  oddly  relevant  to  the  trial  of  Jesus :  '  Let  us  see  if  his  words 
be  true,  and  let  us  try  what  shall  befall  him  in  the  ending  of  his 
life.  For  if  the  righteous  man  is  God's  son,  he  will  uphold  him, 
and  he  will  deliver  him  out  of  the  hands  of  his  adversaries.  With 
outrage  and  torture  let  us  put  him  to  the  test,  that  we  may  learn 
his  gentleness,  and  may  prove  his  patience  under  wrong.  Let  us 
condemn  him  to  a  shameful  death ;  he  shall  be  visited  according 
to  his  words.'  If  the  judges  sought  for  a  plea  on  which  to  condemn 
Jesus,  his  confession  of  the  Messiahship  would  surely  have  sufficed, 
even  if,  in  the  most  technical  sense,  it  was  not  blasphemy. 

If  Jesus  is  asked  '  Art  thou  the  Messiah?'  the  further  question 
is  implied, '  Do  you  expect  to  become  the  King  of  the  Jews,  and 
to  do  all  that  we  have  been  taught  to  believe  that  Messiah  will 
do  ? '  Jesus,  in  his  reply,  asserts  that  he  will  do  what  has  been 
predicted  of  the  Messiah ;  but  he  implies  that  the  fulfilment  will 
only  take  place  after  his  death. 

62.  The  first  part  of  the  reply  of  Jesus  is  a  formal  acknow- 
ledgment of  his  Messiahship.  In  Matthew  and  in  Luke  he  does 
not  do  this.  (Compare  the  parallel  passages  and  the  notes  to 
them.)  Some  {e.g.  J.  Weiss)  suppose  that  in  this  respect  Matthew 
and  Luke  are  nearer  the  truth.  Weiss  thinks  that  the  marked 
divergence  of  Luke  must  show  that  he  followed  a  different  account 
or  version  of  the  trial  which  was  also  more  authentic  and  accurate 
than  that  of  Mark.  In  Matthew's  'Thou  hast  said,'  some  have 
thought  that  Jesus  means  to  say, '  You  suggest  that  I  am  or  claim 
to  be  the  Messiah,  but  /  do  not.'  We  have,  however,  seen  reason 
to  believe  that  Jesus  did  in  some  sense  or  other  claim  to  be  the 
Messiah.  J.  Weiss  thinks  that  Jesus,  as  the  version  in  Luke 
records,  refused  to  answer,  because  there  was  no  common  ground 
between  accuser  and  accused.  He  did  indeed  believe  that  he  was 
the  Son  of  God,  and  he  did  believe  that  it  would  probably  please 
God  to  effect  the  transformation  from  the  one  era  to  the  other 
era,  from  the  old  kingdom  of  sin  and  violence  to  the  new  Kingdom 
of  righteousness  and  peace,  through  him.  But  his  conviction  that 
he  was  the  Son  of  God  was  a  sanctuary  of  faith  into  which  he 
allowed  none  to  enter,  about  which  he  would  not  speak,  which  he 
could  not  and  would  not  explain  to  his  enemies.     And  as  to  the 


XIV.  53-65]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  353 

Messiahship,  that,  too,  in  his  conception  of  it,  would  he  unin- 
telligible to  them.  But  how  subjective  all  this  is,  how  conjectural! 
It  may  be  more  or  less  true,  it  may  be  false.  How  can  we  hope 
to  guess  with  any  approach  to  certainty  what  Jesus  may  have 
meant,  when  we  do  not  even  know  with  any  assurance  what  he 
actually  said  ? 

Jesus  proceeds  not  merely  to  acknowledge  his  Messiahship 
(which,  as  J.  Weiss  says,  is  here  shown  to  have  been  in  truth  not  a 
secret  of  his  disciples,  but  actively  discussed  among  the  populace), 
but  he  also  volunteers  a  statement  that  the  famous  prediction  of 
Daniel  is  soon  to  be  accomplished  before  their  eyes.  He  combines 
with  Daniel  vii.  13  the  equally  famous  phrase  of  Psalm  ex.  i :  'The 
Lord  said  unto  my  lord,  Sit  thou  at  my  right  hand.'  If  Jesus  said 
these  words  we  can  hardly  think  that  he  distinguished  between 
himself,  the  Son  of  man,  and  the  Messiah.  The  Son  of  man  must 
he  the  Messiah,  and  both  must  be  himself  Though  now,  as 
Menzies  says, '  a  Messiah  in  disguise,  he  is  on  the  point  of  being 
invested  with  all  that  belongs  to  the  office.  The  Messiah,  as 
spiritual-minded  Jews  conceived  him,  is  about  to  appear.  Even 
his  enemies  will  see  Jesus  clothed  with  all  the  power  and  splendour 
of  the  Son  of  man,  sitting,  as  that  personage  was  expected  to  do, 
on  the  right  hand  of  the  Power,  the  powerful  or  Almighty  One 
(Jesus  also  avoids  the  divine  name),  and  coming  with  the  clouds 
to  execute  His  judgment  and  set  up  His  Kingdom.'  If  Jesus  said 
the  words,  this  seems  their  most  obvious  explanation.  But  J.  Weiss 
ventures  to  think  that  we  may  regard  the  words,  at  any  rate  as 
Luke  gives  them  (xxii.  69),  as  historical,  and  yet  suppose  that 
Jesus  did  not  necessarily  mean  to  identify  himself  with  the 
mysterious  Son  of  man.  What  Jesus  was  sure  of,  and  never  more 
sure  of  than  now,  when  all  earthly  hope  had  vanished  and  his  own 
death  was  at  hand,  was  that  the  new  era  would  soon  begin,  that 
the  Kingdom  was  about  to  come.  Hence  triumphantly  he  quotes 
the  old  prediction,  convinced  that  the  hour  was  nigh.  God  would 
fulfil  His  word  :  '  so  oder  so,  sei  es  mit  ihm,  sei  es  ohne  ihn,  daniber 
spricht  er  sich  nicht  aus.'  Dr  Carpenter  takes  much  the  same  line. 
'He  may  be  cut  oflf,  like  the  Anointed  Servant  of  an  older  age, 
from  the  land  of  the  living;  but  the  judgment,  the  resurrection, 
are  nigh,  when  he  will  see  of  the  travail  of  his  soul  and  be  satisfied. 
Undaunted,  then,  he  confronts  the  anger  of  the  council,  the  wrath 
of  the  high  priest ;  as  though  he  said,  You  may  kill  me,  but  you 
cannot  baffle  God  !  Messiah  may  perish,  but  the  Son  of  God  will 
come ! '  (First  Three  Gospels,  p.  390). 

W.  argues  against  the  historical  character  of  the  verse.  '  Jesus 
not  only  acknowledges  that  he  is  the  Messiah,  but  calls  himself 
the  Son  of  man  and  predicts  his  Parousia.     It  is  very  improbable 

M.  23 


354  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELa  [XIV.  53-65 

that  he  ever  did  that,  but  most  improbable  of  all  that  he  did  it 
before  the  Sanhedrin....The  solemn  scene  is  pleaded  as  proof 
of  authenticity.  But  if  Luther's  "Here  stand  I,"  when  half  Europe 
was  listening,  is  not  by  any  means  free  from  doubt,  how  can  these 
words  of  Jesus,  spoken  much  less  openly,  and  in  the  absence  of  his 
disciples,  be  guaranteed  by  the  solemn  scene  ? '  In  truth  one's 
judgment  must  be  left  in  suspense.  But  in  view  of  what  they 
had  to  report  to  Pilate,  it  does  seem  as  if  the  judges  would  naturally 
have  tried  to  get  some  evidence  against  Jesus,  and  some  confession 
from  himself,  as  to  his  rumoured  Messiahship.  Beyond  this  we 
cannot  go. 

63.  The  high  priest  tears  his  clothes.  This  was  quite  in  ac- 
cordance with  Jewish  law  and  custom  upon  hearing  a  blasphemy. 
But  it  may  not  be  meant  hei-e  in  a  purely  legal  sense.  To  tear 
one's  clothes  might  also  be  a  sign  of  horror  and  grief. 

If  W.'s  view  that  616  and  62  are  later  interpolations  be  correct, 
then  63  follows  on  61  a.  But  then,  how  could  the  high  priest  say, 
'  ye  have  heard  the  blasphemy '  ?  It  is  rather  lame  to  argue  that 
Jesus's  silence  was  interpreted  by  the  high  priest  as  a  confession, 
or  to  point  out  that  at  all  events  Mark,  unlike  Luke,  has  not  the 
words  'from  his  mouth.' 

64.  Thus  Mark  records  a  formal  condemnation.  It  is  this 
which  J.  Weiss  and  others  regard  as  unhistorical.  It  is  part  of 
the  tendency  to  throw  as  much  blame  as  possible  upon  the  Jews, 
as  little  as  possible  upon  the  Romans.  Luke  does  not  mention  a 
formal  verdict.  It  would  be  enough  to  assume  that  an  informal 
meeting  of  the  Sanhedrin  or  of  some  of  its  leading  members  was 
held,  at  which  Jesus  was  interrogated,  and  perhaps  even  some 
evidence  taken  against  him.  It  was  considered  that  enough  had 
been  elicited  with  which  to  obtain  his  successful  condemnation 
from  the  Roman  procurator. 

M.  Loisy  goes  furthest  in  denying  the  historical  character  of 
the  trial  before  the  high  priest.  He  supposes  that  Luke  has 
preserved  from  the  source  which  both  he  and  Mark  used  one 
accurate  point.  The  meeting  of  the  Jewish  authorities  (not  a 
regular  sitting  of  the  Sanhedrin,  but  a  hurried  and  informal  con- 
sultation) took  place  in  the  morning.  There  were  not  two  meetings, 
as  Mark  would  have  us  believe,  but  one  only.  At  this  meeting  the 
denunciation  of  Jesus  to  Pilate  was  arranged.  Whether  Caiaphas 
then  interrogated  Jesus  is  uncertain ;  probably  he  did  not  do  so. 
Probably  the  whole  scene  before  Caiaphas  is  spun  (with  a  particular 
object),  out  of  the  scene  before  Pilate,  one  historical  fact,  and 
certain  Old  Testament  passages  and  predictions.  It  is  not  certain 
that  the  Sanhedrin,  subject  to  confirmation  by  the  Romans,  could 


XIV.  S3-65]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  3SS 

not  have  condemned  a  man  to  death,  but  Caiaphas  and  his  friends 
preferred  to  denounce  Jesus  to  Pilate  as  a  false  Messiah,  because 
judgment  could  be  more  quickly  obtained,  while  the  judicial  pro- 
ceedings would  be  protected  and  guaranteed  against  any  popular 
movement,  and  upon  the  Roman  governor  would  be  placed  the 
responsibility  of  the  condemnation. 

As  to  the  scene  of  the  trial  before  Caiaphas,  the  saying  about 
the  Temple  is  taken  from  words  of  Jesus  which  he  had  undoubtedly 
used.  But  Loisy  holds  that  the  words  (Mark  xiv.  58) '  made  with 
hands '  and  '  made  without  hands '  have  been  added  to  the  text,  to 
indicate  that  the  Temple  of  which  Jesus  was  thinking  is  the 
Christian  society  or  church,  founded  on  the  faith  in  the  risen 
Christ.  The  true  form  of  the  words  is  maintained  by  Matthew, 
except  that  he  softens  'I  will  destroy'  into  'I  can  destroy.' 
Loisy  holds  that  what  we  now  read  in  xiii.  2  is  less  original  than 
the  words  as  found  in  Matthew  (with  this  slight  correction),  and 
depends  upon  them.     Cp.  the  notes  to  that  passage. 

The  second  part  of  the  trial  deals  with  the  Messianity  of 
Jesus,  and  depends  upon  the  historic  trial  before  Pilate. 

The  object  of  the  whole  scene  is  to  fix  the  responsibility  for 
Jesus's  death  definitely  upon  the  Jews.  It  was  desirable  that  the 
founder  of  the  new  religion  should  not  seem  to  have  been  con- 
demned by  a  just  verdict  of  Pilate.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was 
a  delicate  thing  to  accuse  Pilate  of  prevarication,  and  it  was 
impossible  to  deny  that  the  death  sentence  had  been  uttered  by 
him.  But  the  Jews  were  in  any  case  the  accusers  of  Jesus ;  they 
were  the  enemies  of  nascent  Christianity ;  they  were  detested  in 
the  pagan  world.  Nothing  then  was  more  easy  than  to  enlarge 
their  part  in  the  tragedy  so  as  to  shift  upon  them  the  entire 
responsibility  of  the  verdict.  Hence  the  elaboration  of  the  trial 
before  Caiaphas.  Pilate  has  only  to  confirm  a  sentence  passed  by 
the  Sanhedrin.  Hence  the  episode  of  Barabbas.  The  execution 
of  Jesus  was  the  crime  of  the  Jews;  the  Roman  governor  was 
guiltless  {E.  S.  II.  p.  610). 

Though  Loisy  holds  that  Jesus's  assertion  about  the  Temple 
was  not  mentioned  formally  before  Caiaphas  in  the  way  indicated 
by  Mark,  it  may  nevertheless  have  been  mentioned  to  Pilate. 
For  it  may  well  have  been  regarded  as  an  evidence  of  Messianic 
pretension. 

Thus  Loisy  rejects  the  scene  as  it  stands  as  well  as  W.'s 
amendment.  He  also  refuses  to  admit  the  compromise  of  Dalman 
that  the  blasphemy  was  only  limited  to  the  words  about  the  Son 
of  God  being  seated  at  God's  right  hand,  or  the  compromises  that 
the  high  priest  alleged  a  blasphemy  where  there  was  none,  or 
that  the  Messianic  claim  in  the  mouth  of  a  man  as  impotent  as 

23—2 


3S6  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  53-65 

Jesus  appeared  to  be  amounted  to  blasphemy.  '  The  story  of  the 
nocturnal  sitting  of  the  Sanhedrin  has  been  inserted  into  a 
narrative  (known  to  Luke)  in  which  Peter's  denial  followed  the 
arrival  of  Jesus  at  the  high  priest's  house,  and  in  which  the  sole 
meeting  of  the  enemies  of  Jesus  took  place  in  the  morning  in 
order  to  draw  up  the  denunciation  which  was  to  be  submitted 
straightway  to  the  Roman  governor  (i.e.  join  xiv.  53  a,  54,  66-72, 
XV.  1).  The  trial  before  Caiaphas  has  been  deduced  from  the  trial 
before  Pilate,  the  Evangelist  desiring  to  throw  upon  the  Jews  the 
responsibility  of  the  Saviour's  death.  Mark  is  anxious  to  make 
the  Sanhedrin  pronounce  the  death  sentence.  The  object  of  the 
questioning  of  Jesus  is  to  bring  about  this  sentence,  and  as  the 
Evangelist  knew  that  such  a  judgment  could  not  have  been 
obtained  in  the  very  early  morning  previous  to  the  appearance  of 
Jesus  before  Pilate,  he  devised  a  sitting  at  night.  The  words 
attributed  to  Jesus  about  the  Temple  (which  Mark  has  enlarged) 
may  have  been  borrowed  from  the  real  trial,  when  the  denuncia- 
tions of  the  members  of  the  Sanhedrin  and  the  depositions  of  the 
witnesses,  which  Mark  transposes  to  the  nocturnal  session,  had 
their  proper  place.  The  declaration  according  to  which  the  Christ 
is  called  "  Son  of  God  "  corrects  beforehand  the  historic  definition 
of  the  charge  which  gave  the  motive  of  Jesus's  condemnation : 
namely,  the  avowed  claim  to  the  kingship  over  Israel:  this 
declaration,  if  understood  in  the  sense  in  which  the  Evangelist 
understood  it,  is  blasphemous  in  the  eyes  of  the  Jews,  and  the 
blasphemy  explains  the  sentence  of  death.  The  series  of  outrages 
which  follows  the  condemnation  seems  derived  from  the  mocking 
scene  at  the  Praetorium  and  to  have  been  drawn  up  to  show  an 
accomplishment  of  prophecies '  {E.  8. 1,  p.  102). 

65.  Who  are  the  'some'  who  spit  upon  Jesus  and  hit  him 
with  their  fists  ?  It  is  usually  assumed  that  they  are  some  of  the 
judges.  This  seems  most  unlikely.  Menzies  says :  '  Is  it  some  of 
the  councillors  who  do  these  unworthy  acts,  or  others  who  are 
there,  perhaps  some  of  the  witnesses?  We  cannot  tell.'  Mark 
distinguishes  them  from  the  servants  or  attendants,  whose  turn 
comes  later.  Luke  speaks  only  of  the  men  who  captured  him, 
and  if  any  part  of  the  ill-treatment  is  historic,  this  version 
seems  the  most  likely.  '  To  cover  his  face.'  Matthew  and  Luke 
explain  this  by  adding  to  the  word  '  prophesy,'  '  who  is  it  that 
struck  thee?'  Others  explain  that  Jesus  is  to  foretell  to  the 
strikers  their  punishment.  Perhaps  putting  a  cover  over  his  face 
is  only  meant  to  indicate  that  a  prophet  must  be  withdrawn  from 
the  visible  world  in  order  to  receive  his  inspiration,  or  to  obtain  a 
vision.     W.  thinks  that  the  words  'to  cover  his  face,'  which  are 


XIV.  66-72]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  357 

wanting  in  the  MS.  D,  and  in  the  S.S.,  are  interpolated. 
'  Prophesy '  means  merely,  '  We  will  teach  you  to  prophesy/  or 
'  We  will  make  you  give  up  prophesying ! '  pairia-^iara  are 
apparently  blows  upon  the  cheek.  Either  '  they  received  him — 
took  him  over  into  safe  custody — with  blows,'  or  the  phrase  is  a 
Latinism,  and  means  the  same  as  is  indicated  in  another  reading 
{e^aXov  for  e\aj3op) :  '  they  dealt  out  to  him  blows.' 

How  far  is  this  verse  historic?  It  is  conceivable  that  the 
attendants  or  slaves,  to  whom  Jesus  was  entrusted  after  the  trial, 
ill-treated  and  abused  him,  though  it  is  not  easy  to  say  who  could 
have  reported  it.  J.  Weiss  goes  so  far  even  as  to  call  the  narrative 
'an  extremely  life-like  and  vivid  scene  which  undoubtedly  depends 
upon  the  recollections  of  an  eye-witness.'  Menzies  is  more  cautious. 
'  It  is  not  necessary  to  suppose,'  he  says, '  this  scene  to  be  formed 
on  Isaiah  1.  6;  the  various  incidents  explain  themselves  quite 
naturally.'  That  the  members  of  the  highest  court  of  the  Jews, 
at  any  rate,  should  have  forgotten  their  position,  and  sunk  to  the 
vulgar  cruelty  attributed  to  them,  seems  far  from  'natural.'  Holtz- 
mann  is  a  little  more  cautious  still.  'As  regards  the  fulfilment  of 
X.  34,  the  particular  colours  (die  Farben  im  Einzelnen)  may  be  due 
to  Micah  iv.  14;  Isaiah  1.  6,  liii.  3-5  ;  1  Kings  xxii.  24.'  This  has 
been  shown  by  Brandt  in  detail.  Almost  every  word  in  Mark  xiv. 
65  is  taken  from  the  Greek  versions  of  the  Old  Testament,  in  the 
passages  referred  to  by  Holtzmann.  Even  the  covering  of  the  face 
seems  to  rest  upon  a  mistranslated  and  misunderstood  expression 
in  Isaiah  liii.  3.  Finally,  the  contemptuous  summons, '  prophesy,' 
seems  to  depend  upon  i  Kings  xxii.  24.  Thus  the  historical 
character  of  this  verse  is  exceedingly  dubious.  Loisy,  too,  as  we 
have  seen,  rejects  it.  Like  the  trial  itself,  he  regards  it  as  a  '  de- 
doublement '  of  the  ill-treatment  of  Jesus  by  the  soldiers  (xv.  16-20). 


66-72.    Peter's  Denial 
{Gp.  Matt.  XX vi.  69-75;  Luke  xxii.  56-62) 

66  Now  Peter  was  below  in  the  court.     And  one  of  the  maids  of 

67  the  high  priest  came,  and  when  she  saw  Peter  warming  himself, 
she  looked  at  him,  and  said,  'Thou  too  wast  with   Jesus   the 

68  Nazarene.'     But  he  denied  it,  saying, '  I  do  not  know  or  under- 
stand what  thou  sayest.'     And  he  went  out  into  the  outer  court- 

69  yard.     And  the  cock  crowed.     And  the  maid  saw  him,  and  began 

70  again  to  say  to  the  bystanders,  '  This  is  one  of  them.'    And  he 
denied  it  again.     And  a  little  after,  the  bystanders  said  again  to 


3S8  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XIV.  66-72 

Peter,  'Verily  thou  art  one  of  them:   for  thou  art  a  Galilsean.' 

71  But  he  began  to  curse  and  to  swear,  saying,  'I  know  not  this  man 

72  of  whom  ye  speak.'  And  straightway  the  cock  crowed  a  second 
time.  Then  Peter  called  to  mind  the  word  which  Jesus  had  said 
unto  him, '  Before  the  cock  crow  twice,  thou  wilt  deny  me  thrice,' 
And  he  wept. 

The  admirably  dramatic  scene  of  Peter's  denial  may  reasonably 
be  supposed  to  rest  upon  his  own  honest  report  and  confession, 
though  the  minor  details  are  open  to  question.  J.  Weiss  prefers 
the  version  in  John,  but  Brandt  has  shown  how  improbable  it  is 
that  this  variant  is  historical. 

66.  The  story  takes  up  the  situation  in  which  Peter  had  been 
left  in  54. 

67.  The  fire  shines  upon  Peter's  face  and  reveals  hina. 

68.  He  goes  further  ofif,  to  escape  detection,  into  the  outer 
court.  The  first  crowing  of  the  cock  is  only  found  in  Mark,  and 
not  in  most  of  the  good  manuscripts.  The  two  cockcrowings  are 
highly  dramatic,  but  probably  not  historical.     {Op.  verse  30.) 

69.  In  this  outer  court  there  are  many  persons  collected, 
'not  perhaps  members  of  the  household  only,  but  attendants  of 
councillors  summoned  to  the  meeting,  and  others '  (Menzies).  The 
same  girl  notices  him  again.     Matthew  speaks  of  a  second  girl. 

70.  They  recognize  him  as  a  Galilsean,  according  to  Matthew, 
from  his  speech  or  accent.     This  seems  probable. 

71.  dvade/j.aTi,^ei,v.  The  verb  means  '  to  call  down  curses  upon 
oneself  (if  one  is  not  telling  the  truth). 

72.  The  word  iiri^aXcov  is  hard.  Its  meaning  must  be  '  to 
call  to  mind,' '  to  become  attentive.'  Peter,  however,  had  already 
been  reminded  by  the  cock.  The  word  may  be  corrupt.  It  is 
wanting  in  Luke  and  Matthew.  W.  suggests  that  Mark  originally 
had  only  the  pregnant  phrasing:  'And  straightway  the  cock  crowed 
a  second  time.  And  he  remembered  and  wept.'  '  Dem  Urmarcus 
sahe  es  ahnlich,  dass  er  sich  hier  auf  zwei  Worte  beschrankte :  sie 
verfehlen  die  Wirkung  nicht.'  The  whole  scene  is  indelibly  fixed 
in  the  consciousness  of  the  Western  world.  It  is  full  of  beauty, 
and  yet  awe-inspiring  too.  It  tells  its  own  lessons,  and  its  moral 
need  not  be  drawn  out.  Loisy  regards  the  triple  denial  as  historic; 
not  so  the  prediction  and  the  recollection  and  the  tears.     He 


XV.  1-5]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  359 

thinks  the  original  story  which  Mark  enlarged  can  easily  be  picked 
out  of  the  narrative  and  restored. 

The  source  is  followed  accurately  up  to  68  a.  Then  Peter  is 
wrongly  said  to  have  gone  out '  to  the  outer  courtyard '  (or  vestibule). 
This  is  put  in  here  because  in  the  original  story  his  going  out  is 
connected  with  the  cockcrowing.  To  avoid  the  natural  meaning  of 
'  he  went  out,' '  to  the  outer  courtyard '  is  added,  which  really  con- 
tradicts it.  Then  in  69  one  must  omit '  saw  him '  and '  again,'  which 
are  added  by  the  Evangelist.  Their  removal  gets  over  the  difficulty 
that  the  same  girl  seems  to  speak  to  the  same  people  among 
whom  Peter  had  been  sitting  before,  and  that  the  apostle  is  still 
there,  though  he  had  moved  away.  In  70  one  can  omit '  a  little 
after '  and  '  again,'  intended  to  lengthen  out  the  incident,  and  to 
accentuate  the  triple  denial.  Then  in  72  the  words  must  originally 
have  run :  '  And  he  went  out,  and  a  cock  crew,'  or  '  And  he  went 
out,'  and  it  was  '  cockcrow,'  i.e.  dawn.  Thus  the  second  crowing, 
the  recollection  of  the  prophecy,  the  apostle's  griet^  all  belong  to 
the  work  of  'redaction.'  Peter  hurried  to  get  away,  as  he  felt 
himself  in  peril.  Did  he  make  his  way  at  once  to  Galilee,  or  did 
he  stay  in  Jerusalem  till  the  Friday  evening?  We  cannot  say: 
probably  the  latter.  'Toujours  est-il  que,  s'il  y  a  quelque  part 
dans  le  second  ^^vangile  un  souvenir  personnel  de  Pierre,  c'est  le 
r^cit  du  reniement  en  la  forme  ou  I'a  trouv6  Marc'  {E.  8.  11. 
p.  618). 

CHAPTER  XV 

1-5.    Jesus  before  Pilate 
(Cp.  Matt,  xxvii.  i,  2,  11-14;  Luke  xxiii.  1-5) 

1  And  straightway  in  the  early  morning  the  chief  priests,  with 
the  Elders  and  scribes,  and  the  whole  council  prepared  their 
decision,  and  having  bound  Jesus,  led  him  away,  and  delivered 

2  him  to  Pilate.  And  Pilate  asked  him,  'Art  thou  the  King  of 
the  Jews?'     And  he  answering  said  unto  him,  'Thou  sayest  it.' 

3  And  the  chief  priests  vehemently  accused  him :  but  he  answered 

4  nothing.     And  Pilate  asked  him  again,  saying,  '  Answerest  thou 

5  nothing  ?  see,  of  how  much  they  accuse  thee !'  But  Jesus 
answered  nothing  more ;  so  that  Pilate  marvelled. 

'  In  the  story  of  the  trial  before  Pilate,  the  formal  accusation 
is  wanting  at  the  beginning,  and  the  condemnation  at  the  end. 
It  is  hard  to  see  why  the  governor,  without  yet  knowing  anything. 


36o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  i-j 

asks  Jesus  if  he  is  the  King  of  the  Jews,  and  why  the  accusations 
of  the  priests,  which  become  useless  after  the  avowal  of  Jesus, 
were  not  made  earlier.  The  transposition  has  been  effected  by 
the  redactor  (one  gets  a  better  connection  by  reading  3  or  3-5 
before  2)  either  to  make  the  Pilate  trial  different  from  the  trial 
before  Caiaphas,  or  to  make  the  silence  of  Jesus  more  marked,  or, 
more  probably  still,  to  introduce  the  incident  of  Barabbas.  For 
the  favour,  unexplained  and  inexplicable,  which  Pilate  is  supposed 
to  have  shown  to  Jesus  has  its  reason,  according  to  Mark,  in  the 
silence  of  the  accused,  not  in  the  avowal  of  his  Messianic  claim. 
The  episode  of  Barabbas  corresponds  {fait  pendant)  with  the 
judgment  of  Caiaphas ;  it  is  interpolated  in  the  historic  tale  of  the 
trial  before  Pilate  to  make  us  understand  that  the  governor  did 
not  condemn  Jesus,  but  that  he  merely  allowed  him  to  be  put  to 
death,  in  accordance  with  the  sentence  of  the  Sanhedrin,  after 
having  in  vain  essayed  to  &ee  him  from  the  hatred  of  his  foes' 
{E.  S.  I.  p.  103). 

I.  We  now  pass  from  a  difiScult  and  hardly  conceivable  trial 
before  the  Jewish  authorities  to  a  diflScult  and  hardly  conceivable 
trial  before  Pilate.  The  historic  residue  in  both  cases  seems  to 
reduce  itself  to  the  bare  fact.  Some  Jewish  authorities  procured 
the  arrest  of  Jesus.  They  found  some  means  of  holding  or  de- 
claring him  worthy  of  death — some  charge  upon  which  they  could 
secure  his  condemnation  from  Pilate.  He  was  brought  before 
Pilate,  and  Pilate  condemned  him  to  death.  The  first  fifteen 
verses  of  Chapter  xv  hardly  contain  anything  more  historical 
than  the  short  summary  contained  in  these  few  words :  brought 
before  Pilate,  he  was  by  Pilate  condemned  to  death. 

Mark's  favourite  evdvi  need  not  cause  us  difficulty  or  delay. 
•n-ptot  is  enough.  Jesus  was  crucified  at  9  A.M.  Hence  he  must 
have  been  brought  before  Pilate  very  early  in  the  morning. 

crvfi^ovXiov  iroifidcravTe'i.  The  text  is  not  certain.  Some 
MSS.  read  instead  av/i^ovXiov  TroiijaavTe^,  The  meaning  is  far 
from  clear.  If  the  first  reading  be  taken — and  its  authority  is 
greater — the  meaning  may  be:  'having  formed  a  resolution,'  or 
'having  prepared  their  decision.'  If- we  read  7roiija-avre<},  'having 
taken  counsel '  or '  having  held  a  consultation '  might  be  the  trans- 
lation, perhaps  also  '  having  taken  a  decison.' 

In  either  case  the  idea  is  that  the  court  comes  together  a 
second  time.  A  second  meeting  was  necessary  by  Jewish  law, 
but  then  this  second  meeting  must  be  held  on  anobher  day, 
whereas  the  sessions  at  night  and  at  dawn  would  be  both  on  the 
same  day,  according  to  the  Jewish  method  of  reckoning,  by  which 
the  day  begins  at  sunset. 


XV.  i-s]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  361 

The  interpretation  of  the  words  most  consistent  with  what 
has  gone  before  would  be,  as  W.  says,  '  having  drawn  up  their 
decision,  their  verdict ;  nachdem  sie  den  Beschluss  fertie  eestellt 
hatten.'  ^  ® 

The  expression, '  the  chief  priests  with  the  Elders  and  scribes 
and  the  whole  council,'  seems  too  full.  W.  would  bracket  'the 
Elders  and  scribes.'  One  might  better  include  in  the  bracket 
'the  whole  council'  also.  The  object  of  the  redundancy  is  to 
emphasise  the  wide  and  general  Jewish  responsibility  for  Jesus's 
death. 

It  is  a  further  question  whether  or  no  the  entire  responsibility 
on  the  Jewish  side  should  fall  solely  upon  the  priests.  (As  to  this, 
see  Encyclopcedia  Bihlica,  art.  'Synedrium,' columns  4841  at  bottom, 
and  4842  at  top ;  and  Additional  Note  30.) 

Jesus  is  now  bound.  Mark  does  not  add  Pilate's  oflSce ;  Matthew 
calls  him  d  ■^yeficov — the  governor.  It  was  the  custom  for  the 
Eoman  procurator  to  come  to  Jerusalem  from  Caesarea,  his  usual 
residence,  at  the  season  of  the  Jewish  festivals.  Apparently  this 
was  done  as  a  precautionary  measure  in  case  of  any  disturbance. 

2.  The  opening  of  the  verse  implies  what  is  not  clearly  stated, 
unless  it  is  implied  in  i.  The  Jewish  authorities  must  have  made 
some  formal  accusation  of  Jesus  to  Pilate.  Whether  this  was  done 
by  word  of  mouth  or  by  written  charge,  or  both,  is  not  said,  and 
remains  uncertain. 

Whether  Jesus  was  condemned  by  the  Jewish  authorities 
because  of  what  he  said  about  the  Temple,  or  because  of  his 
claim  to  be  Messiah — it  must  certainly  have  been  the  latter 
allegation  with  which  he  was  charged  before  Pilate.  But  the  term 
Messiah  is  translated  by  the  Roman  authority  into  its  purely 
political  equivalent:    'King  of  the  Jews.' 

Jesus,  interrogated  by  Pilate,  replies :  '  Thou  sayest  it.'  This  is 
usually  interpreted  to  mean  an  absolute  confession.  It  is  alleged 
that  'Thou  hast  said'  is  a  recognized  form  of  affirmation,  or  a 
Jewish  form  of  assent.  This  is,  however,  disputed  and  doubtful. 
(See  Additional  Note  31 ;  and  also  the  corresponding  passage  in 
Luke.)  And  from  what  follows  it  can  be  argued  either  way :  either 
that  Jesus  confessed,  or  that  he  practically  refused  to  answer.  No 
certainty  can  be  achieved.  Anyway,  Jesus  did  not  deny  the 
charge.  It  would  be  consistent  both  with  his  practice  of  evasion 
before  hostile  critics,  and  with  his  own  spiritualised  conception  of 
the  Messiahship  and  Kingship,  if  he  neither  affirmed  nor  denied. 
He  was  not  the  King  of  the  Jews  in  Pilate's  sense  of  king ;  yet  he 
was,  or  was  to  be,  their  king,  in  another  sense,  and  even  in  this 
dark  hour,  his  faith  in  this  kingship,  to  which  God  had  appointed 
him,  did  not  succumb  or  fade  away. 


362  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  1-5 

3.  W.  finds  difficulty  in  this  verse,  at  least  in  its  present 
place.  It  is  not  right,  he  says,  that  the  question  put  by  Pilate 
should  precede  the  accusations  of  the  priests.  And  if  Jesus  had 
already  confessed,  there  was  no  need  for  Pilate  to  urge  him  to  speak. 
On  the  other  hand,  if  '  Thou  sayest  it '  is  not  a  confession,  we  can 
imagine  that  the  priests,  frightened  lest  their  plan  should  not 
succeed,  made  fresh  charges  connected  with,  and  bearing  upon,  the 
main  charge  of  the  kingship  (cp.  Luke  xxiii.  5).  But  we  really 
know,  and  can  know,  nothing  definite  of  what  went  on  before  Pilate. 
Loisy  conceives  that  what  the  primitive  narrative  and  tradition  told 
was  that  Jesus,  denounced  before  Pilate  as  false  Messiah,  did  not 
reply.  Interrogated  by  Pilate,  he  confessed  his  Messiahship.  The 
condemnation  followed.  The  favour  which  Pilate  is  supposed  to 
have  shown  him  is  'unexplained  and  inexplicable'  {E.  S.  II. 
P-  635)- 

4,  5.  Pilate  presses  for  a  reply  to  the  charge,  and  Jesus,  in 
accordance  with  Isaiah  liii.  7,  preserves  silence.  Pilate  marvels 
that  he  does  not  try  to  defend  himself. 

What  probably  happened  was  that  upon  Jesus's  confession  or 
refusal  to  reply  Pilate  condemned  him  out  of  hand.  But  such 
a  brief  narrative  would  not  have  suited  the  Evangelist  or  even 
his  sources.  Two  efiforts  had  to  be  made.  The  first  was  to  show 
that  Jesus  acted  in  accordance  with  prophecy;  the  second,  still 
more  important,  was  to  show  that  the  true  authors  of  the  con- 
demnation were  not  the  Romans,  but  the  Jews.  Pilate  knew  well 
enough  that  Jesus  was  innocent.  There  was  no  danger  in  him. 
He  was  no  revolutionary,  any  more  than  his  disciples  and  followers. 
Pilate  yielded  to  Jewish  hatred  and  clamour.  The  guilt  fell  upon 
the  Jews,  not  upon  the  Romans.  The  whitewashing  of  Pilate  and 
the  Romans  was  most  important,  not  only  in  order  to  blacken  the 
hated  Jews,  but  in  order  to  show  to  the  world  that  the  Roman 
governor  would  have  wished  to  save  Jesus :  that  in  his  eyes  there 
was  nothing  criminal  in  the  founder  of  the  Christian  religion. 
And  if  the  founder  was  harmless,  equally  harndess  must  be  his 
followers. 

6-15.    Jesus,  Pilate  and  Barabbas 
(Cp.  Matt,  xxvii.  15-26;  Luke  xxiii.  18-25) 

6  Now  at  the  festival,  he  used  to  release  unto  them  one  prisoner, 

7  whom   they  chose  to  beg  off.     And  the  so-called  Barabbas  lay 
bound  with  the  rioters  who  had  committed  a  murder  in  the  in- 

8  surrection.     And  the  crowd  came  up,  and  began  to  demand  what 


XV.  6-15]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  363 

9  Pilate  was  wont  to  do  for  them.     But  he  answered  them,  sayino-, 

10  '  Do  ye  wish  that  I  release  unto  you  the  King  of  the  Jews  ? '  For 
he  realized  that  the  chief  priests  had  delivered  him  up  out  of  envy. 

11  But  the  chief  priests  incited  the  people,  that  he  should  rather 

12  release  Barabbas  unto  them.  And  Pilate  answered  again  and  said 
unto  them, '  What  then  shall  I  do  with  him  whom  ye  call  the  King 

14  of  the  Jews  ?'  And  they  cried  out  in  answer, '  Crucify  him.'  Then 
Pilate  said  unto  them,  '  What  evil  has  he  done  ?'     But  they  cried 

15  out  the  more  vehemently,  'Crucify  him.'  And  so  Pilate,  wishing 
to  content  the  people,  released  Barabbas  unto  them,  and  delivered 
Jesus,  when  he  had  scourged  him,  to  be  crucified. 

6.  The  trial  is  now  interrupted  by  an  unexpected  incident — 
of  a  very  doubtful  historical  character.  Its  object  is  still  further 
to  whitewash  Pilate,  and  to  throw  the  responsibility  of  the  cruci- 
fixion upon  the  Jews.  Pilate  would  have  saved  Jesus.  The  Jews 
insist  upon  his  execution.  They  prefer  that  Jesus  should  die 
rather  than  Barabbas. 

The  first  two  verses  of  the  section  are  intended  to  explain 
what  is  to  follow.  The  custom  alluded  to  in  verse  6  is  wholly 
unknown.  It  is  extremely  improbable  in  itself;  and,  whatever 
basis  the  Barabbas  story  may  have,  this  part  of  its  setting  is 
almost  certainly  fictitious.  We  may  also  doubt  whether  the 
Eomans  would  have  pardoned  a  leader  of  a  revolt. 

7.  The  statements  about  Barabbas  seem  very  precise,  and 
suggest  that  some  historical  reminiscence  is  at  the  bottom  of  the 
tale.  Loisy,  however,  calls  them  '  tr^s  vagues,  sous  une  apparence 
de  precision '  {E.  S.  11.  p.  642).  Barabbas  lay  '  bound  with  them 
who  had  made  insurrection,  who  in  the  insurrection  had  committed 
murder '  (so  literally).  What  insurrection  is  referred  to  ?  Is  Mark 
quoting  textually  from  his  source  ?  He  speaks  as  if  everybody 
knew  to  what  he  was  referring.  Is  this,  however,  merely  'a 
popular,  one  might  even  say  childish,  way  of  presenting  a  fact  of 
which  the  writer  himself  knows  nothing '  ?  {E.  S.  II.  p.  642,  n.  4). 
We  are  in  complete  ignorance. 

o  \ey6fj,evo<!  Ba/9a;S/3a?.  The  phrase  is  peculiar.  'The  so- 
called  Barabbas.'  Was  it  a  nickname  ?  For  surely  the  words  do 
not  mean  merely  '  a  man  called  Barabbas.'  Barabbas  is  supposed 
to  mean  'son  of  the  father,'  that  is,  of  the  'master' — the  teacher. 
Was  he  the  son  of  a  known  Rabbi?  We  hear  of  Rabbis  in  the 
Talmud  called  e.g.  Rabbi  Samuel  Bar  Abba,  and  Rabbi  Nathan 
Bar  Abba.  (For  some  further  conjectures  about  this  man  and  his 
name,  see  Additional  Note  32.) 


364  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  6-15 

8.  The  crowd  appear  upon  the  scene  quite  independently  of 
Jesus  and  his  trial.  Pilate  is  sitting  in  his  tribunal  at  the  wonted 
place  and  time ;  or  the  hour  was  announced  beforehand.  It  was 
very  early  in  the  morning.  The  people  came,  we  may  suppose, 
to  prefer  their  requests  and  complaints,  but  more  especially,  ac- 
cording to  the  narrative,  they  came  to  take  advantage  of  the 
custom  which  has  just  been  explained  in  verse  6.  But  '  ni  ces 
details  ni  les  suivants  ne  semblent  k  discuter  au  point  de  vue  de 
I'histoire '  (E.  S.  11.  p.  643). 

9.  Pilate  sees  his  chance.  He  would  like  to  release  Jesus, 
and  thinks  here  is  his  opportunity.  (The  historic  Pilate  was  a 
man  of  different  mould — stern,  pitiless  and  cruel.)  He  suggests 
that  the  prisoner  to  be  released  should  be  Jesus. 

Pilate's  words  ('Do  ye  wish  that  I  release  unto  you  the  King  of 
the  Jews?')  are,  says  Holtzmann,  to  be  regarded  as  a  mixture  of 
pity  and  contempt.  'Shall  I  release  this  harmless  simpleton  who 
apparently  calls  himself  your  king  ? '  The  narrative  implies  that 
the  people  know  what  is  going  on,  and  that  Jesus  has  been  con- 
victed upon  the  charge  of  claiming  to  be  King  of  the  Jews.  Pilate 
is  supposed  to  think,  not  unnaturally,  that  Jesus,  though  hateful  to 
the  priests,  is  liked  among  the  people  at  large. 

10.  Pilate's  view  is  that  Jesus  is  not  worthy  of  death.  His 
kingship  is  not  antagonistic  to  the  Roman  supremacy.  This,  at 
least,  is  what  we  may  suppose  that  Mark  would  wish  us  to  think 
that  Pilate  meant.  Beyond  this  we  cannot,  of  course,  go,  for  that 
the,  historic  Pilate  had  any  such  opinion  as  is  here  ascribed  to  him 
is  extremely  improbable.  Mark's  Pilate  sees  through  the  whole 
thing.  He  realizes  that  Jesus  is  to  be  executed,  not  because,  from 
the  Roman  point  of  view,  he  deserved  it,  but  because  he  was  for 
some  reason  or  other  obnoxious  to  the  Jewish  priests. 

11.  The  deepest  responsibility  is  the  priests';  and  here 
probably  the  story  is  true  enough.  Not  the  'Pharisees,'  not 
the  '  Elders,'  not  the  '  Scribes,'  but  the  governing  priesthood, 
were  the  true,  or,  at  any  rate,  the  main,  authors  of  Jesus's 
death. 

Barabbas,  it  is  implied,  was  well  known  and  popular.  Hence 
the  priests  suggest  to  the  populace  to  ask  for  Barabbas  instead  of 
Jesus.  Matthew  has  a  different  version.  He  makes  Pilate  himself 
proffer  the  two,  and  bid  the  people  choose  between  them. 

That  the  people  are  now  against  Jesus  is — though  probably  not 
historic— not  psychologically  incredible.  Jesus  had  disappointed 
them.  He  had  played  and  lost.  The  hopes  which  he  had  aroused 
in  them  had  been  dashed  to  the  ground  by  his  arrest.     Let  him 


XV.  6-1  s]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  S^S 

pay  the  penalty  for  his  folly.  It  is  also  possible  that  the  priestly 
party  had  helped  to  this  change  of  feeling.  Loisy  is  more  sceptical : 
'That  the  people,  when  Jesus  was  once  a  prisoner,  should  have 
passed  suddenly  from  admiration  to  hate,  that  not  content  with 
preferring  Barabbas,  they  should  have  demanded  in  their  rage  the 
crucifixion  of  Jesus,  that  Pilate  should  have  lent  himself  to  this 
furious  caprice,  or  that  the  priests  should  have  had  time  (verse  ii) 
between  the  suggestion  of  Pilate  (9)  and  the  people's  reply  to 
change  their  feelings  towards  Jesus — all  these  are  traits  that 
belong  rather  to  legendary  fiction  than  to  history,  and  rather 
resemble  a  theatrical  efifect  in  a  melodrama  or  in  a  childish  play 
than  historical  reality '  (^E.  8.  11.  p.  644). 

12.  The  rejoinder  of  Pilate  is  almost  ludicrously  inappropriate 
for  a  Roman  governor.  But  the  motive  is  obvious.  The  Jews  are 
to  pronounce  the  sentence,  not  Pilate,  Not  thus  were  Roman 
governors  wont  to  deal  with  their  prisoners ! 

Pilate's  words  again  assume  that  Jesus  and  his  claim  are  well 
known.  The  interrupted  trial  is  to  be  concluded.  But  the  people 
and  not  Pilate  are  to  be  the  judges.  What  do  they  wish  Pilate  to 
do  with  the  man  whom  they  call  their  King  ?  Another  reading  is 
rather  easier.  '  What  would  ye — say ! — that  I  should  do  with  the 
King  of  the  Jews  ? ' 

13.  The  people  demand  the  punishment  of  death  in  its  most 
terrible  form.  Crucifixion  was  a  Roman  method  of  execution, 
introduced  by  them  into  Palestine,  and  reserved  for  the  worst 
offenders  and  criminals.  The  famous  cry,  '  crucify  him ! '  is  cer- 
tainly unhistoric ;  but  of  what  oceans  of  human  blood  and  of  what 
endless  human  misery  has  this  invention  been  the  cause !  ■n-dXiv, 
says  W.,  must  here  be  regarded  as  equivalent  to  an  Aramaic 
'but,'  'thereupon.'  Or  perhaps  it  merely  refers  to  verse  1 1.  There 
the  people  cry  out  for  the  release  of  Barabbas ;  here  they  cry  out 
again,  but  this  time  for  the  execution  of  Jesus. 

14.  Pilate  is  even  made  to  go  so  far  as  to  urge  that  Jesus  is 
quite  innocent.  But  the  Jews  will  hear  of  no  defence  or  ex- 
culpation, and  Pilate  has  to  give  way. 

15.  Pilate  is  anxious,  or  thinks  it  best,  to  satisfy  the  people. 
Hence  he  releases  Barabbas,  while  Jesus  is  condemned  to  death 
by  crucifixion.  Before  the  sentence  was  carried  out,  the  criminal 
was  scourged.  Note  TrapeStoKev.  '  The  Evangelist  tries  to  avoid 
saying  that  Jesus  was  sentenced  and  condemned  by  Pilate.  He 
wants  the  reader  to  understand  that  Pilate  was  constrained  by  the 


366  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  6-15 

Jews  to  allow  the  sentence  of  death  pronounced  by  the  Sanhedrin 
to  be  carried  into  effect'  (E.  S.  Ii.  p.  645). 

W.  attempts  to  preserve  a  certain  amount  of  the  story:  'When 
Pilate  came  up  to  Jerusalem  for  the  festival,  he  held  his  court 
there  upon  serious  cases  in  which  the  judgments  of  the  native 
tribunals  needed  confirmation :  he  could  occasionally  exercise  his 
power  of  pardon.  These  circumstances  probably  are  at  the  bottom 
of  the  tale.... Pilate  does  not  consider  the  mere  fact  that  Jesus 
regards  himself  as  King  of  the  Jews  an  adequate  ground  for  his 
condemnation,  seeing  that  he  has  not  broken  the  peace,  or  done 
anything  to  get  the  kingdom  into  his  hands.'  Not  very  con- 
vincing. 

Brandt  has  a  different  view.  He  'takes  the  kernel  of  the 
story  to  be  that  a  certain  prisoner  who  had  been  arrested  in 
connection  with  some  insurrection,  but  against  whom  no  crime, 
or  at  least  no  grave  crime,  could  be  proved,  was  released  on  the 
application  of  the  people,  who  intervened  on  his  behalf  because  he 
was  the  son  of  a  Rabbi.  The  incident,  even  though  it  was  not 
simultaneous  with  the  condemnation  of  Jesus,  gave  occasion  in 
Christian  circles  for  the  drawing  of  this  contrast :  the  son  of  the 
Rabbi  was  interceded  for  and  released ;  Jesus  was  condemned. 
In  the  course  of  transmission  by  oral  tradition  the  statement  of 
this  contrast  might  gradually,  without  any  conscious  departure 
from  historical  truth,  have  led  to  the  assumption  that  the  two 
things  happened  at  the  same  time  on  the  same  occasion.  Finally, 
the  liberation  of  a  seditious  prisoner — in  any  case  a  somewhat 
surprising  occurrence — seemed  explicable  only  on  the  assumption 
of  some  standing  custom  to  account  for  it ;  this  assumption  must 
presumably  have  arisen  elsewhere  than  in  Palestine.'  This  extract 
from  the  Encyclopaedia  Biblica,  art.  'Barabbas,'  well  sums  up 
Brandt's  hypothesis,  which  seems  somewhat  far-fetched. 


16-20.    Jesus  is  mocked  by  the  Soldiees 
(Gp.  Matt,  xxvii.  27-31) 

16  Then  the  soldiers  led  him  away  into  the  courtyard,  which 
is  the  Praetorium;   and  they  called  together  the  whole  cohort. 

17  And  they  clothed  him  with  purple,  and  wove  a  crown  of  thorns, 

18  and  put  it  upon  his  head,  and  they  began  to  salute  him,  'Hail, 

19  King  of  the  Jews ! '     And  they  beat  him  on  the  head  with  a  cane, 
and  spat  upon  him,  and  bent  the  knee,  and  did  him  reverence. 

20  And  when  they  had  mocked  him  thus,  they  took  off  the  purple 


XV.  1 6-20]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  367 

from  him,  and  put  his  own  clothes  on  him,  and  led  him  out  to 
crucify  him. 

16.  Jesus  is  now  at  the  mercy  of  the  Roman  soldiery.  He  is 
titterly  bereft  of  friend  and  earthly  hope.  To  the  physical  agony 
of  the  scourging  there  is  added  mockery  and  insolent  contempt. 
The  narrative  in  its  brief  intensity  is  very  poignant. 

Jesus  is  led  away  from  the  presence  of  Pilate — (it  is  not  said 
where  he  is  scourged,  or  even  whether  the  scourging  preceded  the 
scene  of  the  mockery) — into  the  courtyard  of  the  house  where  the 
governor  was  living. 

'  Which  is  the  Prsetorium '  seems  to  be  a  gloss  inserted  from 
Matthew,  who  thinks  of  Jesus  as  taken  from  the  governor's  house 
to  the  barracks  of  the  soldiers.  But  the  meaning  of  Prsetorium 
in  the  Gospels  is  disputed.  Matthew  probably  meant  by  it  the 
fortress  of  Antonia,  which  was  the  headquarters  of  the  Roman 
garrison.  Or  it  may  be  that  the  trial  is  supposed  by  Mark  to 
have  taken  place  at  this  citadel,  to  which  Pilate  had  come. 

A  cohort  (airetpa)  consisted  of  600  men.  The  numbers  are 
a  detail. 

17.  Whether  the  scene  is  historic  is  doubtful.  There  are 
arguments  on  both  sides.  (See  below.)  The  crown  of  thorns 
parodies  the  royal  laurel  wreath. 

19.  With  the  mock  homage  insult  and  blows  are  mingled. 
The  «a\a/to9,  or  reed,  is  to  represent  a  sceptre.  In  Matthew  it 
is  first  put  in  his  hand,  and  then  he  is  hit  with  it.  A  stick  or 
cane  made  of  a  stout  reed  is  what  is  meant. 

20.  This  verse  seems  to  imply  that  the  scourging  had  already 
taken  place.  His  own  clothes  had  been  removed  from  him  for 
the  scourging,  and  after  it  he  is  invested  with  the  purple  to  add 
insult  to  agony.     Now  his  own  clothes  are  put  on  him  once  more. 

Recent  investigations  have  made  it  rather  less  unlikely  that 
the  scene  of  Jesus  being  mocked  by  the  soldiery  may  be  historical. 
There  are  curious  parallels  to  the  Gospel  story,  into  the  details  of 
which  I  cannot,  however,  enter.  We  know  about  the  Persian 
festival  of  the  Sacaea,  at  which  a  prisoner  condemned  to  death 
was  put  upon  a  mock  royal  throne,  invested  with  royal  purple, 
and  allowed  to  have  his  royal  will  for  a  season.  After  that  he 
was  flogged  and  hanged.  This  practice  has  many  parallels,  and 
goes  back  to  widespread  religious  ideas  and  ceremonies,  of  which 
the  learned  author  of  the  Golden  Bough  has  so  much  to  tell  us. 
And  Philo  records  an  odd  scene  once  enacted  in  Alexandria,  of 
which  the  mock  hero  was  one  Carabas,  a  name  that  gives  us- 


368  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  16-20 

pause.  It  is  conceivable  that  the  soldiers — possibly  Orientals- 
seeing  that  Jesus  was  condemned  upon  the  charge  of  kingship, 
may  have  mocked  him  in  the  way  in  which  the  hero  of  the  Sacaea 
and  of  similar  ceremonies  and  carnivals  was  mocked.  Some,  among 
whom  is  Loisy,  see  here  and  in  what  Philo  says  the  origin  of  the 
incident  of  Barabbas.  Does  the  name  Carabas  conceal  the  name 
of  Barabbas  ?  Was  Jesus  delivered  up  to  the  soldiers  to  be  crucified 
'in  the  style  of  or  'in  place  of  Barabbas,  who  would  then  be  not 
a  historic  individual,  but  the  name  of  a  personage  who  figured  as 
king  in  popular  festivals  parallel  to  the  Koman  Saturnalia  and 
the  Persian  Sacsea?  {E.  S.  11.  pp.  653,  654)- 


21-32.    The  Crucifixion 
{Cp.  Matt,  xxvii.  32-44;  Luke  xxiiL  26-43) 

21  And  they  compelled  one  Simon  of  Cyrene  (the  father  of 
Alexander  and  Rufus),  who  happened  to  be  passing  by  from  the 

22  country,  to  carry  his  cross.     And  they  brought  him  unto  the  place 

23  Golgotha,  which  is,  being  translated,  The  place  of  a  skull.  And 
they  offered  him  wine  mixed  with  myrrh  :    but  he  did  not  take  it. 

24  And  they  crucified  him,  and  they  divided  his  garments,  casting 

25  lots  for  them,  what  each  man  should  take.     And  it  was  the  third 

26  hour  when  they  crucified  him.  And  the  inscription  of  the  charge 
against  him  was  written   above  him:  'The  King  of  the  Jews.' 

27  And  with  him  they  crucified  two  thieves;  the  one  on  his  right 
hand,  and  the  other  on  his  left. 

29        And  the  passers-by  reviled   him,  wagging  their  heads,  and 

saying, '  Ah,  thou  that  destroyest  the  temple,  and  buildest  it  in 

30,  31  three  days,  save  thyself,  and  come  down  from  the  cross.'    Likewise 

also  the  chief  priests  with  the  scribes  mocked  him,  saying  to  one 

32  another, '  He  saved  others ;  himself  he  cannot  save.  The  Messiah ! 
The  King  of  Israel !  Let  him  descend  now  from  the  cross,  that  we 
may  see  and  believe.'  And  they  that  were  crucified  with  him 
scoffed  at  him. 

Until  the  death  of  Jesus  Loisy  supposes  that  the  Evangelist 
followed  an  older  source,  which  he  enlarged  and  embroidered.  The 
older  source  contained  'sobres  indications'  concerning  the  departure 
from  the  Prsetorium,  Simon  of  Cyrene,  the  crucifixion,  the  inscrip- 
tion on  the  cross,  the  two  robbers,  the  insults  of  the  passers-by  and 


XV.  21-32]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  369 

of  the  robbers,  the  last  cry  of  Jesus,  and  the  exclamation  of  the 
centurion.  Thus  older  and  more  historic  portions  of  the  narrative 
would  be  206,  21,  22  a,  24  a.  26,  27,  29,  30,  326,  37,  39  (E.  S.  1. 
p.  104). 

21.  The  statement  contained  in  this  verse  is,  in  all  probability 
historic.  The  two  men,  Alexander  and  Eufus,  were  probably 
known  both  to  the  Evangelist  and  to  many  of  his  readers.  They 
knew  from  their  father  that  he  had  been  compelled  to  carry  the 
cross  (or  part  of  it)  upon  which  Jesus  was  suspended,  dyyapeveiv 
is  the  technical  word  for  'impress'  (cp.  Matt.  v.  41). 

The  usual  idea  is  that  Jesus  was  too  exhausted  by  the  scourging 
and  the  mental  agony  to  carry  his  own  cross,  as  was  the  prevailing 
Boman  custom. 

Simon  came  from  the  country;  not  necessarily  from  work 
among  the  'fields.'  But  still,  though  this  is  not  necessary,  the 
words  would  be  more  natural  if  the  day  of  the  crucifixion  were 
not  a  holiday — not  the  first  day  of  the  Passover.  However,  Simon 
may  have  merely  been  returning  from  a  walk  or  visit,  such  as 
would  have  been  permissible  on  the  festival.  It  is  even  supposed 
that  if  field  work  had  been  meant,  the  Greek  would  have  been 
diro  Tov  dypov,  and  not  merely  diro  dypov. 

22.  The  place  of  the  crucifixion  must  have  been  some  hill 
outside  the  city  walls,  which,  from  its  shape,  was  called  '  skull,'  or 
'  skull  place.'     It  cannot  any  longer  be  identified. 

23.  The  '  wine '  referred  to  must  have  been  the  concoction 
which  was  given  to  Jews  who  were  about  to  suffer  the  penalty 
of  death,  in  order  that  they  might  lose  consciousness.  The  pre- 
paration of  this  drugged  wine  seems  to  have  been  left  to  the  hands 
of  the  ladies  of  Jerusalem,  who,  doubtless,  regarded  making  and 
giving  it  as  a  deed  of  piety. 

Who  offered  the  wine  to  Jesus?  We  are  not  told.  Was  it 
the  women  who  '  looked  on  from  a  distance '  ?  (40).  It  must, 
anyway,  have  been  offered  by  Jews  or  Jewesses. 

It  was  not '  wine  mixed  with  myrrh,'  for  apparently  myrrh  would 
have,  if  anything,  the  contrary  effect.  The  Talmud  says  that  it 
was  frankincense  which  produced  the  benumbing  result  upon  the 
consciousness. 

Jesus  refused  the  wine.  This,  too,  may  be  historic.  Either  he 
determined  to  suffer  with  full  consciousness,  or  he  had  still  not 
given  up  hope  of  a  miraculous  intervention  from  God.  Some  are 
inclined  to  think  the  verse  an  addition  to  the  '  source '  (a  doublet 
of  the  vinegar  (36),  says  Loisy,  and  an  incident  in  which  the 
fulfilment  of  ancient  prophecies  was  indicated).    Note  in  the  Greek 

M.  24 


370  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  21-32 

the  presents  in  22  and  24,  with  the  past  tense  in  23.     In  my 
English  translation  I  have  put  the  past  tense  throughout. 

24,  25.  The  awful  event  is  narrated  briefly,  simply,  calmly. 
The  division  of  the  garments  is  an  embroidery,  in  order  to  show 
the  fulfilment  of  Psalm  xxii.  18;  but  it  is  a  fact  that  the  clothes 
of  crucified  persons,  who  suffered  quite  naked,  were  the  perquisites 
of  the  executioners. 

The  'third  hour'  is  9  A.M.  Some  think  that  verse  25,  with  its 
repetition  of  the  fact  of  the  crucifixion,  is  a  later  addition.  Matthew 
and  Luke  do  not  give  the  hour. 

26.  '  The  inscription  of  the  charge  against  him  was  written 
above  him :  The  King  of  the  Jews.'  This,  again,  may  be  historical ; 
for  it  was  customary  to  attach  a  tablet,  with  the  crime  or  charge 
for  which  the  condemned  were  to  suffer,  either  to  their  necks  or  to 
the  cross  itself. 

Jesus,  then,  suffered  because  he  was  accused  of  claiming  to  be 
King  of  the  Jews.     The  brief  words  were  enough  to  tell  the  tale. 

27.  In  spite  of  28,  which  has  been  inserted  from  Luke  xxii.  37, 
and  is  wanting  in  the  best  MSS.,  the  statement  that  two  other 
men  were  crucified  with  Jesus  may  be  historical.  We  need  not 
suppose  an  intentional,  added  ignominy.  Their  execution  was  due, 
and  it  was  convenient  to  crucify  the  three  criminals  on  the  same 
spot. 

29.  How  far  what  now  follows  is  historical  is  doubtful.  For 
it  closely  follows  the  expressions  of  Psalm  xxii.  7;  moreover,  it 
is  not  easy  to  see  who  could  have  reported  the  incidents  and 
the  words. 

It  is  natural  that  W.  should  regard  29  as  historical,  for  it 
supports  his  theory  that  Jesus  was  condemned  for  his  prediction 
about  the  Temple. 

30.  The  taunt,  even  if  not  historic,  admirably  fits  the  situation, 
and  augments  the  horror. 

31.  The  statement  about  the  priests  and  the  Scribes  may  be 
rejected  with  the  utmost  confidence.  They  would  not  have  come 
out  on  purpose  to  feast  their  eyes  upon  the  spectacle  of  their 
enemy  upon  the  cross.  That  kind  of  thing  rather  befits  the  officers 
of  the  Inquisition  than  the  members  of  the  Sanhedrin.  Brandt 
thinks  the  words  in  32  are  a  sort  of  echo  of  taunts  often  made  in 
later  days  by  opponents.  '  He,  who,  as  you  would  have  us  believe, 
was  the  Saviour  of  the  world,  the  Messiah,  could  not  save  himself! 
Why,  if  he  were  God's  Son,  did  he  not  come  down  from  the  cross?' 


XV.  33-39]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  37 1 

(Compare  the  reasoning  in  Wisdom  of  Solomon  ii.  17-20,  which  is 
directly  used  in  Matt,  xxvii.  43.) 

Equally  doubtful  are  the  revilings  of  the  robbers.  Who  re- 
ported them  ? 

33-39-    The  Death  of  Jesus 
(Op.  Matt,  xxvii.  45-54 ;  Luke  xxiii.  44-47) 

33  And  at  the  sixth  hour  darkness  came  over  the  whole  land 

34  until  the  ninth  hour.  And  at  the  ninth  hour  Jesus  cried  with 
a  loud  voice,  saying,  'Eli,  Eli,  lama  sabachthani?'  which  is,  being 
translated,  'My  God,  my  God,   why   hast  thou   forsaken  me?' 

35  And  some  of  the  bystanders,  when  they  heard  it,  said, '  Behold,  he 

36  calls  Elijah.'     And  one  ran  and  filled  a  sponge  full  of  vinegar,  and 
^     put  it  on  a  cane,  and  gave  him  to  drink,  saying, '  Let  alone ;  let  us 

37  see  whether  Elijah  will  come  to  take  him  down.'     But  Jesus 

38  uttered  a  loud  cry,  and  expired.     And  the  curtain  of  the  temple 

39  was  rent  in  twain  from  the  top  to  the  bottom.  And  when  the 
centurion,  who  stood  by,  opposite  to  him,  saw  that  he  so  expired, 
he  said,  'Truly  this  man  was  a  Son  of  God.' 

33.  Jesus,  according  to  Mark,  endured  six  hours  of  agony 
upon  the  cross  before  his  death.  Often,  before  the  release  of 
death  came,  a  much  longer  interval  elapsed. 

The  darkness  which  fell  upon  the  face  of  the  land  (or  earth) 
happened  at  noon.  There  can  be  no  ordinary  natural  eclipse  of 
the  sun  at  the  full  moon  of  Eastertide.  The  miracle  depends  upon 
such  passages  as  Amos  viii.  9 ;  Exodus  x.  22 ;  Jer.  xv.  9.  More- 
over, darkness  and  eclipses  were  often  supposed  to  have  happened 
on  specially  solemn  occasions.  Thus  an  eclipse  of  the  sun  is  said 
to  have  taken  place  upon  the  Ides  of  March,  at  the  murder  of 
Csesar,  *at  the  sixth  hour  till  night.' 

34.  According  to  Mark,  Jesus  only  makes  one  utterance  upon 
1      the  cross.     He  quotes  the  words  of  Psalm  xxii.  i,  applying  them 

to  himself 

Two  questions  present  themselves.      The  first  is :  Did  Jesus 
really  say  the  words  ?     The  second  is :  If  he  said  them,  what  did 
%■-    he  mean  ? 

I  Many  scholars  think   that,    like   the   other   borrowings   from 

i;  Psalm  xxii.,  these  words  too  were  borrowed  from  the  same  source, 
I  not  by  Jesus,  but  by  the  Evangelist,  or  by  tradition.  Jesus  died 
I      with  a  '  loud  cry.'     What  did  he  say  ?    What  had  he  said  ?     Pious 

24 — 2 


372  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  33-39 

phantasy  soon  found  answers ;  hence  what  we  now  read  in  Mark 
and  Luke.  Jesus  was  the  Messianic  hero  predicted  and  represented 
in  the  Psalm.  Therefore,  he  is  made  to  quote  its  opening  words, 
not  because  those  who  put  these  words  in  his  mouth  thought  that 
he  was,  or  that  he  believed  that  he  was,  forsaken  of  God,  but 
because  they  are  the  opening  words  of  the  Psalm — because  they 
were  merely  taken  to  mean  an  impassioned  invocation  unto  God. 
So,  for  instance,  argue  Brandt  and  J.  Weiss.  The  latter  says: 
'  The  Evangelist  probably  did  not  trouble  himself  as  to  the  deeper 
meaning  of  the  words ;  he  probably  just  regarded  and  used  them 
as  a  fulfilled  prophecy  from  a  Messianic  psalm.'  So  too  Loisy.  If 
Luke  and  John  disliked  to  attribute  the  words  to  Jesus,  that  only 
shows  that  Christian  feeling  was  more  '  afiBnd '  in  the  last  years  of 
the  century  than  about  70  {E.  S.  il.  p.  685).  It  is  argued,  more- 
over, that  the  only  reporters  of  what  happened  at  the  crucifixion 
were  the  women  who  'stood  afar  ofif.'  They  might  have  heard 
the  'loud  cry,'  but  would  not  have  distinguished  any  words. 

Others  argue  that  just  these  words  would  not  have  been  as- 
signed to  Jesus.  Why  should  the  dying  Messiah  have  been  made 
to  indicate  any  lack  of  faith,  even  though  the  famous  Messianic 
Psalm  opens  with  these  words  ?  Luke  clearly  felt  the  objection  to 
them.     Hence  he  substituted  a  quotation  from  Psalm  xxxi.  5. 

Those  who  regard  the  words  as  authentic  interpret  them  in 
different  ways.  Dr  Carpenter's  interpretation  has  been  already 
alluded  to.  '  What  do  the  words  mean  ? '  he  asks.  '  Do  they 
denote  defeat  and  desolation  ? '  Though  such  an  interpretation 
is  natural  at  first,  it  '  seems  inconsistent  with  the  whole  character 
of  Jesus,  and  especially  with  the  inner  history  of  the  fatal  nights 
The  possibility  of  death  had  been  in  sight  for  weeks.  He  had 
come  to  Jerusalem  ready  to  face  the  worst.  As  it  approached, 
it  proved  indeed  a  trial  more  grievous  than  even  he  had  fore- 
seen. But  in  Gethsemane  he  had  solemnly  offered  himself  to 
God.  Could  he  flinch  when  the  offer  was  accepted  ?  What  pain 
and  shame  could  undo  his  trust,  or  sever  the  fellowship  of  his 
spirit  with  the  Father  ?  It  is  more  congruous,  therefore,  with 
his  previous  attitude,  to  interpret  the  cry  as  a  final  declaration  of 
faith.  The  verse  opens  the  passionate  pleading  of  one  of  Israel's- 
hymns ;  but  the  Psalm  which  begins  with  desolation  closes  with. 
glowing  hope  (24-28) : 

He  hath  not  despised  nor  abhorred  the  affliction  of  the  afflicted  ; 

Neither  hath  he  hid  his  face  from  him  ; 

But  when  he  cried  unto  him,  he  heard... 

And  all  the  ends  of  the  earth  shall  remember,  and  turn  unto  the  Lord^ 

And  all  the  kindreds  of  the  nations  shall  worship  before  thee. 

For  the  kingdom  is  the  Lord's  ; 

And  he  is  the  ruler  over  the  nations. 


XV.  33-39]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MABK  373 

'  With  this  last  affirmation  of  the  Kingdom  Jesus  died '  (First 
Three  Gospels,  p.  393). 

Mr  Menzies  and  Holtzmann  argue  in  much  the  same  way. 

On  the  other  hand,  B.  Weiss  considers,  not  without  force,  that 
to  make  Jesus  think  of  the  whole  Psalm  and  its  close  in  quoting 
its  opening  words  is  somewhat  arbitrary,  and  introduces  into  'a 
moment  of  immediate  feeling'  'das  Fremdartige  der  Reflexion.' 
Jesus  believed  that  God,  if  he  chose,  could  efifect  hia  purpose  in 
another  way — all  is  possible  to  God — and  thus  he  asks  in  his 
agony,  why  has  God  refused  to  him  special  and  miraculous  in- 
tervention ?  Pfleiderer  argues  strongly  on  the  same  side.  For  such 
an  interpretation  fits  in  with  his  whole  picture  of  the  last  days  at 
Jerusalem,  and  his  view  that  Jesus  until  the  last  believed  that 
the  Kingdom  was  to  be  realized  upon  earth,  and  in  his  own  life- 
time, not  through  his  death.  His  words  upon  the  cross  imply 
that  he  regarded  his  fate  as  the  shipwreck  of  his  holiest  hopes. 
Of  this  view  we  shall  hear  more  in  the  notes  on  Luke. 

35.  Did  Jesus  say  the  words,  if  he  said  them,  in  Hebrew  or 
in  Aramaic?  Mark  reports  them  in  Aramaic;  Matthew  largely 
in  Hebrew.  The  misunderstanding  spoken  of  in  verse  35  requires 
the  Hebrew.  'Eli'  could  be  mistaken  for  'Elijah';  not  the  Aramaic 
'  Eloi.'  Moreover,  the  bystanders  would  have  understood  Aramaic, 
their  own  language ;  they  might  not  have  understood,  and  hence 
might  have  misinterpreted,  the  Hebrew  sounds.  Jesus  might  well 
have  known  the  Psalms  in  Hebrew.  '  The  Aramaic  may,'  says 
Menzies, '  be  due  to  a  corrector  who  reflected  perhaps  that  Aramaic, 
and  not  Hebrew,  was  spoken  in  Palestine  at  this  time.'  So,  too, 
Brandt. 

The  bystanders  must  have  been  Jews,  who  alone  would  know 
about  Elijah  and  his  connection  with  the  Messiah.  But  that  there 
were  Jews  present  as  well  as  Roman  soldiers  seems  unlikely. 

Elijah  was  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  Messiah.  Moreover, 
there  is  firequent  mention  of  him  in  Jewish  legend  as  appearing  to 
people  in  moments  of  distress  and  danger.  It  seems  strange  that 
B.  Weiss  should  say  that  'without  doubt'  Roman  soldiers  are 
meant,  and  that  it  is  'very  improbable'  that  they  would  not  have 
heard  of  Elijah.  Equally  strange  is  his  view  that  the  soldiers 
kaew  the  meaning  of  the  Syriac  and  Aramaic  '  Eloi '  well  enough, 
and  that  the  interpretation  they  give  of  it  is  only  a  malicious 
perversion. 

36.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  man  who  ofifers  the  sponge 
drenched  with  vinegar  was  a  soldier,  a  difficulty  arises  as  to  the 
end  of  the  verse.     There  are  various  suggestions. 

It  seems  necessary  that  the  man  with  the  sponge  should  be 


374  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  33-39 

one  of  the  group  mentioned  in  3 5.  Were  they  then  not  soldiers  but 
Jews  ?  And  was  this  Jewish  bystander  allowed  to  take  some  ot  the 
soldiers'  wine  and  give  it  to  Jesus?  But  this  seems  extremely  un- 
likely. But  if  it  was  a  Roman  soldier  who  held  up  the  sponge  to 
the  sufferer  (by  means  of  fixing  the  sponge  upon  the  end  of  a  tall 
cane)  in  order  to  relieve  the  agonising  thirst,  how  could  he  have 
said  what  follows  at  the  end  of  the  verse  ?  The  difficulty  was  felt 
by  Matthew,  who  changes  the  subject  ('but  the  others  said '),  and 
the  S.S.  does  the  same  in  this  very  verse  of  Mark. 

The  meaning  of  the  words  apparently  is  that  the  giver  of  the 
drink  wants  to  prevent  his  companions  from  hindering  him  in  his 
act  of  mercy.  Hence  he  affects  to  follow  up  what  had  been  said 
before,  and  suggests  that  they  should  allow  him  to  keep  Jesus 
alive  by  the  drink  in  order  that  they  might  see  whether  Elijah 
would  come  to  take  him  down  from  the  Cross.  All  this,  however, 
seems  very  strained. 

The  difficulties  are  about  equally  great,  whether  the  giver  of 
the  drink  is  conceived  to  be  a  Roman  soldier — for  then  he  knows 
about  Elijah,  and  the  'bystanders'  must  also  be  soldiers — or 
whether  the  bystanders  and  the  giver  of  the  drink  are  all  Jews. 
Hence,  W.  regards  35  and  366  as  later  inventions — partly  at  least 
upon  sesthetic  grounds.  'The  impression  made  by  the  moving  cry 
of  despair  is  painfully  spoiled  by  the  misunderstanding  of  the  on- 
lookers. Yet  it  might  easily  have  come  into  the  mind  of  Christians 
who  talked  Aramaic  and  were  ignorant  of  Hebrew.  They  might 
readily  have  thought  that  the  Messiah  in  the  moment  of  his 
deepest  need  would  have  called  upon  the  man  who  was  to  prepare 
and  make  smooth  his  path:  "Elijah,  Elijah,  where  art  thou?," and 
this  interpretation  would  have  the  more  quickly  occurred  to  them 
as  it  removed  the  stumbling-block  of  the  Messiah  thinking  him- 
self forsaken  by  God.'  Or  perhaps  the  play  upon  words  was 
created  by  the  Jews.  The  disciples  said  Jesus  cried  out  '  Eli,  Eli.' 
But  no  '  Eli' — i.e.  no  Elijah — came.  There  was  none  to  rescue  or 
intervene. 

Whether  the  episode  with  the  sponge  is  historical  cannot  be 
decided.  Roman  soldiers  had  a  drink  called  posca,  which  was 
made  of  water,  vinegar  and  egg.  There  may,  therefore,  have  been 
the  necessary  material  present.  On  the  other  hand.  Psalm  Ixix. 
21  :  '  In  my  thirst  they  gave  me  vinegar  to  drink,'  causes  suspicion. 
Luke  uses  the  vinegar  at  an  earlier  period.  {Cp.  Luke  xxiii.  36.) 
Loisy  thinks  that  the  earliest  tradition  knew  of  only  one '  cry'  before 
the  death.  This  was  interpreted  and  explained  and  doubled  in 
various  ways.  The  ascription  of  the  exclamation  in  Psalm  xxii. 
(a  fulfilment  of  prophecy)  to  the  dying  Messiah ;  the  call  upon 
iSlijah,  the  precursor  of  the  Messiah,  grew  up  independently,  and 


XV.  33-39]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK.  375 

were  then  combined.  Independent  too  at  first  was  the  fulfilment 
of  Psalm  Ixix.  The  vinegar  owes  its  origin  to  the  Psalm;  it  is  not 
the  posca.  Moreover  this  drink  '  fait  double  emploi  avec  le  vin 
aromatis^  dont  Marc  a  parM  plus  haut '  {E.  8.  II.  pp.  684-686). 

37.  It  is  implied  that  Jesus  accepted  the  proffered  drink. 
But  it  did  not  keep  him  long  alive.  He  gave  one  last  loud  cry — 
a  cry  which  may  have  reached  to  the  ears  of  the  women  who 
watched  from  a  distance — and  expired. 

A  good  deal  has  been  written  about  the  loud  cry — its  possibility 
and  its  meaning.  Usually  sufferers  upon  the  cross  died  of  slow 
exhaustion.  Jesus  seems  to  have  died  after  a  comparatively  short 
period  of  agony.  Perhaps  some  vital  organ  gave  way :  there  was 
a  momentary  spasm  of  acutest  pain,  a  loud  cry,  and  then  all 
was  over. 

Brandt  thinks  the  'loud  cry'  unlikely  to  have  been  invented, 
and  therefore  probably  historic.  So  too  Loisy.  It  is  probably  the 
only  detail  which  comes  from  the  primitive  tradition.  The  women 
may  have  heard  the  cry;  or  Simon  of  Cyrene  {E.  S.  11.  pp. 
680,  681). 

38.  The  curtain  of  the  Temple  is  rent  in  twain.  The  symbolic 
meaning  of  the  miracle  is  that,  through  the  death  of  Jesus,  there 
was  now  a  complete  and  unimpeded  access  to  God.  'In  the  Jewish 
Temple  God  was  behind  a  veil,  which  was  never  lifted  except  once 
a  year  to  the  high  priest;  but  Christians  have  access  or  admission' 
(Menzies).  The  thought  is  elaborated  and  clearly  expressed  in 
Hebrews  x.  19-25,  ix.  1-12;  Ephesians  ii.  14-18.  Oddly  enough, 
though  Jesus  would  have  been  the  last  to  wish  it,  the  'access'  to 
the  Father,  so  immediate  and  intimate  in  prophetic  and  even 
in  Rabbinic  Judaism,  has  been  obscured  by  the  doctrine  of  the 
Mediator  and  of  the  divine  Son.  It  is  a  curious  irony  that  Jesus, 
who  would  so  intensely  have  disliked  the  idea  that  he,  or  any 
other  man,  should  stand  between  the  divine  Father  and  his 
human  children,  has  yet  been  made  to  occupy  this  position. 
There  was  no  gulf  and  so  no  bridge  was  required ;  yet  for  the 
sake  of  an  imaginary  evil,  a  needless  remedy  was  devised. 

Another  interpretation  of  the  passage  is  apparently  favoured 
by  W.,  and  has  ancient  support.  The  rending  of  the  veil  means 
the  mourning  of  the  Temple ;  it  bewails,  not  the  death  of  Jesus, 
but  its  own  imminent  destruction. 

39.  The  centurion  calls  Jesus  '  a  Son  of  God.'  On  what  does 
he  base  his  remark,  which  is  not  out  of  place  in  a  heathen's  mouth, 
for  '  Son  of  God '  would  merely  mean  to  him  a  demi-god,  a  divine 
being  ?     The  usual  interpretation  is  that  the  captain  is  impressed 


376  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  33-39 

by  the  '  loud  cry,'  so  umisual  from  those  who  suffered  on  the  cross. 
Instead  of  languor  and  prostration,  Jesus  at  the  very  moment  of 
death  shows  vigour  and  power.  Though  this  view  is  shared  by  the 
MS.  D.,  which  adds  Kpa^avra  to  ovtox;,  W.  calls  it  'scurrilous 
nonsense,'  perhaps  because  B.  Weiss,  among  others,  adopts  it. 
Hence  he  supposes  that  the  outoj?  ('thus')  means  'under  such 
circumstances,'  and  refers  it  to  the  'darkness'  mentioned  in  33, 
This  seems  less  likely. 

'  The  captain,'  says  J.  Weiss,  '  stands  at  the  end  of  the  Gospel 
as  the  type  and  forerunner  of  the  countless  bands  of  heathen 
who  have  been  won  over  to  the  message  of  the  crucified  one. 
The  conjecture  is  near  at  hand  that  the  captain  became  afterwards 
a  Christian.'  In  that  case,  his  utterance  might  be  authentic.  In 
the  Gospel  according  to  Peter  he  is  called  Petronius.  But  Mark 
does  not  know  his  name,  which  gives  rise  to  justifiable  doubts; 
and  Brandt  roundly  asserts:  'Dass  wir  mit  einer  evangelischen 
Dichtung  zu  thun  haben,  ist  offenbar.'  There  were  many  motives 
which  would  have  stimulated  the  invention,  and  it  provides  a  fine 
conclusion  to  the  story.  The  '  loud  cry '  was,  probably,  to  the 
Evangelist  a  '  cry  as  of  thunder,'  a  supernaturally  loud  cry ;  such 
as,  to  the  captain's  mind,  only  a  god  could  have  uttered  at  such  a 
moment,  on  such  an  occasion.  Loisy  also  is  suspicious.  He  denies 
that  'Son  of  God'  means  merely  in  the  centurion's  mouth  'divine 
hero '  or  '  demi-god.'  Not  so  did  the  Evangelists  understand  it. 
We  have  to  do  with  a  regular  conversion,  a  true  confession  of 
faith.  Perhaps  the  centurion  is  intended  to  represent  the  first 
homage  rendered  by  the  Gentile  world  to  the  world's  Saviour. 


40,  41.    The  Women  who  saw 
(Cp.  Matt,  xxvii.  55,  56;  Luke  xxiii.  48,  49) 

40  There  were  also  some  women  looking  on  from  a  distance,  among 
whom  was  Mary  Magdalene,  and  Mary  the  mother  of  James  the 

41  Little  and  of  Joses,  and  Salome  (who  already,  when  he  was  in 
Galilee,  had  followed  him,  and  attended  to  him) ;  and  many  other 
women  who  came  up  with  him  unto  Jerusalem. 

Here  we  have  a  probably  historical,  and,  if  so,  a  valuable,  re- 
miniscence. The  crucifixion  was,  though  from  a  distance,  actually 
witnessed  by  some  of  Jesus's  own  female  friends.  Incidentally, 
too,  Mark  makes  an  important  statement  that  already  in  Galilee 
Jesus  had  been  followed  and  waited  on  by  some  women,  and  that 


XV.  42-47]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  377 

others  had  joined  him  on  his  way  to  Jerusalem.  Luke  had  made 
a  similar  statement  at  an  early  stage  (viii.  1-3).  There  can  be 
little  doubt  that  in  Jesus's  attitude  towards  women  we  have  a 
highly  original  and  significant  feature  of  his  life  and  teaching. 

Mary  of  Magdala  is  so  called  from  her  place  of  birth  or 
residence,  near  Tiberias.  There  is  no  reason  whatever  to  identify 
her  with  the  woman  who  had  been  a  sinner,  of  Luke  vii. 

The  second  Mary  is  said  here  to  be  the  mother  of  James  the 
Less  and  of  Joses.  'James  is  called  the  Little  or  the  Less  to 
distinguish  him  from  the  other  "celebrities"  of  the  name.  But 
whether  it  designates  him  as  less  in  stature,  or  in  age,  or  of  less 
importance,  there  are  no  data  for  determining'  (Gould).  Some 
conjecture  that  this  James  the  Less  is  James  the  son  of  Alphaeus, 
the  apostle  mentioned  in  iii.  18.  The  more  famous  James  was 
the  son  of  Zebedee.  According  to  another  tradition,  Mary  was  the 
daughter  of  James. 

The  'many  others'  may  be  an  unhistoric  exaggeration.  Matthew 
does  not  mention  them.  Salome  was  apparently  the  mother  of  the 
sons  of  Zebedee,  if  we  may  make  this  inference  on  the  ground  that 
Matthew,  in  place  of  Mark's  Salome,  puts  '  the  mother  of  the  sons 
of  Zebedee.' 

Loisy  points  out  that  the  women  are  mentioned  in  this  place 
to  prepare  for,  and  lead  the  way  to,  the  story  of  the  burial  and  the 
story  of  the  empty  tomb.  As  he  regards  neither  of  these  stories 
as  historical,  he  is  disposed  to  be  somewhat  sceptical  as  to  the 
presence  of  the  women.  At  all  events  their  presence  cannot  be 
regarded  as  attested  by  the  oldest  tradition.  'La  presence  de 
celles-ci  [the  Galilsean  women]  k  Jt^rusalem,  autour  de  Jesus  et 
ses  disciples,  pent  6tre  une  donn^e  de  I'histoire,  et  mSme  leur 
presence  sur  le  Calvaire :  mais  cette  donn^e  ^tait  tout  k  fait 
accessoire  dans  la  tradition,  tant  qu'on  ne  songea  pas  a  faire  de  ces 
femmes,  qui  pouvaient  bien,  en  effet,  etre  rest^es  k  Jerusalem 
quand  tons  les  ap6tres  dtaient  d^j^  partis,  les  premiers  t^moins  de 
la  resurrection '  (E.  S.  11.  p.  708). 

42-47.    The  Bueial  of  Jesus 
(Gp.  Matt,  xxvii.  51-61 ;  Luke  xxiii.  50-56) 

42  And   as   the    evening   was   already  at  hand,  because  it  was 

43  the  Preparation,  that  is,  the  day  before  the  sabbath,  Joseph  of 
Arimathsea,  an  honourable  councillor  who  himself  too  was  waiting 
for  the  kingdom  of  God,  came,  and  ventured  to  go  to  Pilate,  and 

44  asked  for  the  body  of  Jesus.    And  Pilate  marvelled  that  he  should 


378  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  42-47 

have  already  died,  and  he  summoned  the  centurion,  and  asked  him 

45  whether  he  was  long  dead.     And  when  he  was  informed  by  the 

46  centurion,  he  gave  the  body  to  Joseph.  And  he  bought  fine  linen, 
and  took  him  down,  and  wrapped  him  in  the  linen,  and  laid  him 
in  a  sepulchre  which  was  hewn  out  of  a  rock,  and  rolled  a  stone 

47  against  the  door  of  the  sepulchre.  And  Mary  Magdalene  and  Mary 
the  mother  of  Joses  watched  where  he  was  laid. 

42,  43.  The  burial  of  Jesus,  as  described  in  this  paragraph, 
is  probably,  in  substance,  historic.  As  has  been  pointed  out,  its 
main  points  'tradition  was  not  likely  to  have  invented.'  Isaiah 
liii.  9  is  inadequate  for  that,  and  is  not  quoted  in  the  Gospels. 
That  the  body  of  Jesus  was  buried  is  confirmed  by  Paul  in  i  Cor. 
XV.  4. 

The  part  played  by  Joseph  of  Arimathsea  (his  birth-place  or 
residence  is  usually  identified  with  Ramathaim  mentioned  in 
I  Mac.  xi.  34,  or  with  the  locality  mentioned  in  r  Sam.  L  i)  is 
also  probably  to  be  regarded  as  historic.  Mark  calls  him  evaxvf^'^'v 
^ov\evTij<;,  '  an  honourable  councillor,'  which  is  usually  interpreted 
to  mean  that  he  was  a  member  of  the  Sanhedrin.  If  so,  the  obvious 
question  arose :  what  part  had  he  played  at  the  trial  ?  and  this 
was  answered  by  Luke  xxiii.  51.  More  probably  the  words  mean 
merely,  as  the  adjective  so  applied  leads  us  to  infer,  a  man  of 
high  social  rank.  It  is  highly  rash  to  assume,  as  J.  Weiss  does, 
that  Joseph  was  present  at  the  trial,  or  even  that  any  part  of  the 
account  of  the  trial  in  the  Gospels  is  due  to  him. 

Joseph  is  said  to  be  also  himself  expecting  the  Kingdom  of 
God.  This  does  not  mean  that  he  was  a  disciple  of  Jesus,  or  that 
he  even  expected  Jesus  to  bring  the  Kingdom  about.  There  were 
Pharisees  who  eagerly  expected  the  Kingdom — and  even  expected 
it  soon.  Such  a  one  was  Joseph.  He  may  have  been  sympathetic 
towards  Jesus  and  his  teaching,  but  it  does  not  follow  that  he  was 
a  regular  disciple,  though  it  was  only  natural  that  Mark's  words 
would  soon  be  understood  in  that  sense.  It  seems,  however,  very 
unlikely  that  Joseph  was  not  even  in  sympathy  with  Jesus  or  his 
teaching,  but  that  he  simply  acted  (more  probably  as  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  Sanhedrin)  in  order  to  carry  out  the  law  of 
Deuteronomy.  'Speed  was  essential;  the  law  enjoined  burial, 
and  it  also  enjoined  the  Sabbath  rest.  The  only  way  of  fulfilling 
the  law  of  burial  without  breaking  the  Sabbath  law  was  to  use  a 
grave  close  to  the  place  of  crucifixion '  (so  Lake,  The  Resurrection 
of  Jesus  Christ,  pp.  174,  182). 

Matthew  calls  him  '  rich.'  This  addition  is  probably  not  due 
to  Isaiah  liii.  9,  but  was  suggested  by  his  action  and  position. 


XV.  42-47]        THE  GOSPEL  AOCOBDING  TO  MARK  379 

' eixTx/ifuuv  had   obtained  in  vulgar  speech  the  meaning  "rich," 
though  it  properly  means  "  of  good  standing  " '  (Lake,  p.  50). 

Only  here,  for  the  first  time,  and  quite  casually,  does  Mark 
mention  that  the  day  of  the  crucifixion  was  Friday.  The  words 
are  not  without  difficulty.  Jesus  died  at  3  P.M.  The  sun  would 
set  between  six  and  seven.  Joseph  can  only  have  heard  of  the 
death  some  little  while  after  it  took  place.  Indeed,  Mark  says 
'it  was  already  evening.'  The  word  6-\jria<!,  W.  urges,  never  means 
an  earlier  moment  than  sunset.  Hence,  W.  says  that  he  cannot 
understand  what  eVet,  '  since,'  refers  to.  It  cannot,  he  contends, 
imply  that  because  it  was  not  permissible  to  take  a  body  down 
from  the  cross  and  bury  it  on  the  Sabbath,  therefore  there  was  no 
time  to  lose.  For  the  Sabbath  had  already  begun.  Perhaps, 
however,  the  meaning  may  be  that  Joseph  was  anxious  that  as 
little  of  the  Sabbath  as  possible  should  be  defiled  by  the  body  (or 
bodies,  though  we  hear  nothing  of  the  two  thieves,  or  whether 
they  were  yet  dead)  remaining  upon  the  cross.  John  xix.  31 
attributes  this  anxiety  to  the  Jews.  Perhaps,  too,  the  law  of 
Deut.  xxi.  22,  23,  had  to  do  with  the  matter. 

In  any  case,  the  verse  makes  the  Synoptic  chronology  very 
unlikely.  For  if  Jesus  was  crucified  upon  the  first  day  of  Pass- 
over, one  holy  day  was  succeeded  by  another,  and  the  words, 
5j'8i?  61/rta?  yevo/^evT]^,  iirei  rjv  irapaa-Kevrj  ('as  the  evening  was 
already  at  hand,  because  it  was  the  Preparation ')  become  quite 
unintelligible.  They  have  only  a  meaning  if  the  Friday  was  not  a 
festival.  Loisy  continues  his  scepticism.  Even  the  Friday  is  to 
him  dubious.  '  The  Passover  of  the  Last  Supper  in  the  Synoptics, 
and  the  Passover  of  the  crucifixion  in  the  fourth  Gospel,  the  Sabbath 
eve  of  the  burial,  and  the  Sunday  of  the  resurrection,  are  symbolic 
data,  from  which  it  is  now  difficult  for  the  historian  to  disentangle 
the  point  of  departure  in  the  actual  facts.  Note  too  that  Mark's  "  for 
it  was  Friday  "  comes  as  a  sort  of  extra  {comme  en  surcharge).  Yet  it 
is  only  by  this  sort  of  gloss — though,  one  must  admit,  already  known 
to  Matthew,  Luke  and  John — that  the  day  of  the  week  on  which 
the  crucifixion  took  place  has  been  ascertained '  (E.  S.  11.  p.  700). 
Lake  too  suggests  that  the  clause  iTrel...7rpoadfi^arov  ('because 
it  was... Sabbath')  may  be  an  addition  to  the  original  text.  It 
appears  that  eVet  is  nowhere  else  found  in  Mark  (Lake,  p.  52). 

Only  Mark  has  '  ventured.'  But  it  is  very  plausible.  For, 
according  to  Roman  law  or  custom,  the  bodies  of  crucified  persons 
were  not  buried.     They  were  allowed  to  rot  where  they  hung. 

44.  Pilate's  wonder  is  probably  invented.  He  is  astonished 
that  death  should  have  supervened  so  rapidly.  It  is  clear  that 
the  early  death  was  looked  upon  as  something  of  a  wonder  or 


38o  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  42-47 

a  divine  mercy.  Six  hours  of  appalling  agony  is  little !  One 
shudders  to  think  of  such  agony  prolonged  for  a  whole  day,  or 
even  longer,  as  it  would  appear  did  occasionally  happen. 

45.  Pilate  grants  Joseph's  request.  It  is  implied  that  a  brihe 
or  payment  would  not  have  been  unusual;  but  Pilate  sanctions 
the  burial  without  any  such  preliminary.  It  has  been  suggested 
that  44  and  45  may  have  been  added  later.  'There  is  a  very 
harsh  change  of  subject  which  disappears  if  44  and  45  are  omitted, 
and  the  word  ehwprja-aro  is  not  found  elsewhere  in  the  New 
Testament  except  in  2  Peter  i.  3'  (Lake,  p.  53). 

46.  The  sun  must  have  set ;  yet  Joseph  is  able  to  buy  the 
linen  he  required.  The  vault  in  which  Joseph  places  the  body 
may  have  been  near  the  place  of  crucifixion.  It  is  not  said  by 
Mark  that  it  was  his  own  grave-vault,  or  that  no  use  had  been 
made  of  it  before.  It  is  not  said  that  it  was  intended  to  be  the 
final  resting-place  of  the  body.  The  vault  was  hewn  out  of  the 
rock,  as  places  for  burial  are  in  the  East  (Menzies).  But  the 
details  of  the  tomb  may  be  due  to  Isaiah  xxii.  16,  xxxiiL  16 
(Septuagint).  So,  too,  the  stone  which  Joseph  rolled  against  the 
opening  may  be  due  to  the  narrative  which  follows,  or  to  the 
stone  of  Gen.  xxix.  2,  3.  But,  as  Menzies  says,  '  the  tomb  had  to 
be  guarded  against  wild  beasts  and  against  thieves;  and  this 
was  commonly  done  in  the  way  here  described.'  (See  the  article 
'  Tomb '  in  Encyclopedia  Biblica.) 

Joseph  appears  suddenly,  and  as  suddenly  disappears.  The 
following  remarks  of  Brandt  deserve  consideration :  '  There  is 
every  reason  to  believe  that  the  man  who  buried  the  body  of 
Jesus  did  not  belong  to  his  regular  adherents,  that  he  executed 
his  pious  work  as  quietly  as  he  could,  and  afterwards  showed 
himself  no  more  in  Jerusalem.  For  otherwise,  when  the  Galilseans 
returned  with  the  cry,  "  Jesus  has  risen,"  Joseph,  whether  gladly 
or  reluctantly,  would  have  had  to  play  a  part.  Neither  the  Jewish 
authorities  nor  the  disciples  would  have  left  him  in  peace ;  friend 
and  foe  would  have  talked  much  more  about  the  tomb  than  is 

now  noticeable  in  the  tradition Ramathaim  was  not  far  from 

Jerusalem.  The  expression  "  Joseph  of  Ramathaim "  indicates 
that  the  person  so  named  had  not  continued  to  live  there ;  but 
that  he  was  or  remained  a  resident  in  Jerusalem  is  not  by  any 
means  implied.  Perhaps  before  or  soon  after  the  disciples  returned 
to  the  city  he  left  Judaea  and  went  abroad.  Perhaps  his  very 
name  first  became  known  abroad,  through  some  accidental  com- 
bination of  circumstances,  and  then  came,  through  tradition,  to 
the  knowledge  of  the  Evangelist'  {op.  cit.  p.  312). 


XV.  42-47]         THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  381 

Loisy  thinks  that  the  entire  story  of  Joseph  and  of  the 
entombment  is  as  unhistoric  as  the  discovery  of  the  empty  tomb 
itself.  'On  pent  supposer  que  les  soldats  d6tachferent  le  corps 
de  la  croix  avant  le  soir,  et  le  mirent  dans  quelque  fosse  commune, 
oil  Ton  jetait  p^le-m61e  les  restes  des  supplicids '  {E.  S.  i.  p.  223). 
If  this  scepticism  is  justified,  and  the  body  of  Jesus  was  treated  as 
Loisy  supposes,  there  would  be  something  wonderfully  dramatic 
in  such  a  fate  for  such  a  corpse.  Here  is  the  body  of  a  man  who 
is  to  exercise  the  greatest  influence  of  any  man  of  all  mankind 
upon  the  history  and  civilization  of  the  world,  who  is  to  be 
worshipped  as  God  by  untold  millions  of  men,  thrown  unregarded, 
uncared  for,  into  a  common  ditch,  to  mingle  undistinguished  with 
the  malefactors'  bones  which  filled  it.  That  would  be  indeed  a 
contrast  and  an  irony  worthy  of  the  event  and  its  results. 

47.  The  two  Marys  watch  the  burial.  It  is  not  said  whether 
they  had  remained  all  the  time  at  the  same  place  from  which 
they  saw  the  crucifixion ;  but  this  is  perhaps  implied.  If  the 
tomb  was  near  the  cross,  the  women  could  have  seen  how  the 
body  was  recovered  and  buried.  It  is  hardly  to  be  inferred,  with 
B.  Weiss,  that  they  went,  after  the  burial,  up  to  the  spot  and 
looked  at  it.  The  imperfect  iOewpovv  rather  implies  that  they 
watched  from  their  post  the  process  of  entombment.  Or  if  the 
point  is  pressed,  that  only  two  women  see  the  entombment,  we 
may  assume  that  these  two  leave  their  former  post  of  observation, 
and,  following  Joseph,  draw  nearer  to  the  grave. 

The  second  Mary  is  called  Mapia  77  'Itoo-j^Toy.  W.  says  this 
must  be  translated  '  the  daughter  of  Joses,'  which  would  conflict 
with  XV.  40.  But  Swete  says :  '  sc.  /j.tjttjp'  and  so  Holtzmann. 
The  point  is  unimportant.  All  the  details  of  the  story  of  the 
entombment,  says  Loisy,  are  conceived  in  view  of,  and  to  lead 
up  to,  the  discovery  of  the  empty  tomb.  Mark  would  impress 
upon  our  notice  that  the  same  people  who  saw  the  entombment 
saw  also  the  empty  tomb.  He  only  wants  to  introduce  a  little 
variety  in  making  a  considerable  number  of  persons  watch  the 
death  of  Jesus,  while  two  only  of  these  witness  the  entombment, 
and  three  the  discovery  of  the  empty  grave  {E.  S.  11.  p.  707). 

It  is  hardly  desirable  to  add  any  general  note  upon  the 
crucifixion  and  death  of  Jesus.  For,  if  a  beginning  were  to  be 
made,  it  would  not  be  easy  to  stop.  Those  who  believe  in  a  God 
of  Righteousness  can  only  bow  the  head  in  awed  and  yet  trustful 
submission  at  the  strangely  mixed  means  which  He  takes  for  the 
progress  of  mankind,  at  the  painful  and  involved  interconnection 
of  good  and  evil.     In  spite  of  the  endless  misery  which  was  to 


382  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XV.  42-47 

come  upon  the  Jews  because  of  the  death  of  Jesus ;  in  spite  of  the 
false  theology  and  the  persecutions  and  sore  evils  (apart  wholly 
from  the  Jewish  misery) ;  in  spite  of  the  wrongs  which  were  to  be 
done  to  liberty,  to  enlightenment,  to  toleration,  and  to  righteous- 
ness by  the  Christian  Church — one  yet  sees  that  the  death  of 
Jesus,  even  as  his  life,  was  of  immense  benefit  to  the  world. 
Christianity,  as  we  know  it,  and  as  Paul  made  it,  was  due  to  his 
death  as  much  as,  if  not  more  than,  to  his  life.  Some  fundamental 
truths  of  Judaism  (though  not  all  of  them)  have  been  taught  to  a 
large  proportion  of  the  world  by  Christianity ;  and  while  in  some 
directions  it  obscured  those  truths,  in  others  it  expanded  them. 
That  this  might  be  done,  the  '  chosen  people '  have  had  to  suffer. 
For  the  law  of  election  seems  to  go  even  further  than  Amos 
realized,  though  what  he  said  was  sufficiently  startling  and  revolu- 
tionary. For  Amos  said  :  '  You  only  have  I  known  out  of  all  the 
inhabitants  of  the  earth;  therefore  I  will  visit  upon  you  your 
iniquities.'  But  even  this  is  not  enough.  Nineteen  centuries  of 
suffering  compel  us  to  realize  that  for  some  august  reason  or 
purpose  we  must  say,  '  You  have  I  called :  therefore  ye  shall  suffer 
undeservedly.' 

The  precise  proportion  of  responsibility  which  belongs  to  any 
section  of  the  Jews  of  Jerusalem  for  the  death  of  Jesus  must 
always  remain  doubtful  and  uncertain.  But  the  probability,  as  we 
have  seen,  is  that  the  Sadducean  priesthood,  perhaps  backed  up 
by  some  of  the  leading  Rabbis,  were  responsible,  together  with  the 
Romans,  for  his  death.  Yet  what  matters  this,  so  far  as  God  is 
concerned  ?  We  are  disposed  to  find  a  difl&culty  in  the  '  third  or 
fourth  generation'  of  the  Second  Commandment.  Yet  if  the  death 
of  Jesus  had  been  unanimously  voted  by  the  entire  Jewish  people, 
with  votes  taken  by  plebiscite  or  referendum,  what  difference  would 
it  make  ?  Third  or  fourth  generation !  Why,  there  have  been 
fifty  generations  !  And  the  roll  is  not  yet  ended,  and  there  seems 
no  prospect  of  its  close !  For  in  substitution  of  the  Master's 
command,  'Ye  shall  love  your  enemies,'  Christianity  has  forged 
another :  '  Ye  shall  hate  your  enemies  to  the  fiftieth  and  sixtieth 
generation.' 

But  this  is  the  will  of  God  in  His  scheme  for  the  progress  of 
the  world.  We  do  not  understand  why.  But  the  Jews  have  ever 
to  realize  that  they  have  received  the  consecration  of  supremest 
suffering,  and  that  they  still  remain  the  bunted,  hated,  wounded, 
but  deathless  witnesses  of  God. 


XVI.]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDINa  TO  MARK  383 


CHAPTER  XVI 

It  is  unnecessary  for  the  purposes  of  this  book  to  add  lengthy 
notes  to  the  brief  narratives  which  tell  the  story  of  the  resur- 
rection. It  would  suffice,  for  those  who  want  to  gain  a  very 
convenient  conspectus  of  the  whole  subject,  to  read  the  article 
on  the  resurrection  narratives  in  the  Encyclopcedia  Biblica.  There 
will  be  found  a  complete  summary  of  the  facts  and  of  the  main 
theories.  There,  too,  is  enumerated  the  full  tale  of  the  incon- 
sistencies of  the  various  Gospels  with  each  other,  and  with  the 
statements  of  Paul.  For  the  purposes  of  this  book  it  is  the 
narratives  about  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus  which  are  of 
the  greatest  importance,  while  those  which  tell  of  his  death 
are  less  important,  and  those  which  describe  his  resurrection  are 
least  important  of  all.  Dr  Carpenter,  in  that  splendid  chapter 
of  his  book  which  he  calls  'The  Jesus  of  History,'  says:  'The 
resurrection  is  not  here  discussed,  as  it  belongs  properly  to  the 
history  of  the  Church.'  And  this  is  doubtless  correct.  But,  over 
and  above  this  reason,  there  are  others  which  make  lengthy  notes 
upon  the  resurrection  chapters  unnecessary  in  this  place.  For 
this  book  is  not  polemical,  and  it  is  also  not  an  apology.  It 
frankly  assumes  the  Jewish  point  of  view.  If  a  Jew  were  to  write 
a  commentary  upon  the  Gospels  in  order  to  show  why,  in  spite 
of  them,  he  remains  in  reUgion  a  Jew,  and  does  not  become  a 
convert  to  Christianity,  he  would  have  to  show  why  the  resur- 
rection narratives  are  wholly  insufficient  for,  and  do  not  even  help 
towards,  his  conversion.  He  would  then  have  to  dwell  at  length 
upon  their  difficulties  and  inconsistencies ;  he  would  have  to  show 
why  he  ranges  himself  with  those  Christian  critics,  such  as  the 
author  of  the  article  in  the  Encyclopcedia  Biblica,  who  deny  the 
empty  tomb,  the  material  or  semi-material  risen  body,  or  even 
the  'objective'  vision.  But  the  author  of  this  book  need  not  enter 
into  these  discussions.  He  writes  frankly  as  a  Jew,  and,  therefore, 
as  one  who  does  not  so  'believe  in'  the  resurrection  as  would 
logically  compel  him  to  change  his  creed.  He  is  not  concerned 
either  to  defend  his  own  faith  or  to  attack  the  faith  of  others. 

The  most  probable  views  of  the  resurrection  stories  to  the 
present  commentator  are  based  upon  the  assumption  that  there 
is  a  real  foundation  for  these  stories.  In  other  words,  that  the 
disciples,  or  some  of  them,  saw  a  vision  of  Jesus  which  they  believed 
to  be  a  vision  of  their  risen  Master.  The  assumption  is  that  in 
that  sense,  and  within  these  limits,  the  Gospel  narratives  are 
historic.  It  is  an  assumption,  for  it  can  never  be  proved;  but, 
all  things  considered,  it  seems  the  most  probable  assumption — far 


384  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XVI. 

more  probable  than  the  opposite  assumptions,  that  the  stories  are 
fabricated,  or  that  the  disciples  told  what  they  knew  to  be  false, 
or  that  they  are  completely  legendary,  and  grew  up  as  legends  do 
grow  up,  no  man  knowing  how. 

If,  then,  there  is  historic  truth  at  the  bottom  of  the  narratives — 
though  the  truth  did  not  include  much  (such  as  the  empty  tomb) 
which  the  narratives  now  contain — that  truth  can,  roughly  stated, 
be  one  of  two  main  possibilities :  Either  the  disciples,  or  some  of 
them,  or  one  of  them,  not  merely  saw  a  vision  of  Jesus,  but  what 
they  saw  was  Jesus  in  some  special  supernatural  manifestation ; 
or,  though  the  vision  was  real  to  them,  it  was,  as  we  should  now 
say,  '  only  a  vision,'  and  had  no  further  reality,  being  exclusively  a 
'  product  of  the  mental  condition  of  the  seer.' 

The  first  of  these  possibilities,  again,  may  be  held  in  the  form 
that  the  disciples  saw  what  we  should  call  the  '  spirit '  of  Jesus, 
either  '  in  true  spirit  form  or  in  some  kind  of  acquired  visibility,' 
or,  it  may  be  held  in  the  form  that  what  they  saw  was  'only  a 
visionary  image  without  any  real  appearance  of  Jesus,'  but  that 
'  this  visionary  image  was  produced  in  their  souls  immediately  by 
God  in  order  that  they  might  be  assured  that  Jesus  was  alive' 
{Encyclopedia  Bihlica,  art. '  Resurrection,'  col.  4077).  And  even  in 
the  first  form  we  may  hold,  as  Prof  Lake  has  pointed  out,  that  the 
real  spiritual  being  was  only  perceived  by  the  disciples  under  the 
conditions  and  limitations  of  their  minds  and  senses.  The  'being' 
had  an  objective  existence,  but  what  they  'heard'  or  'saw '  was  due 
as  much  to  them  as  to  'it'  (Lake,  pp.  271,  272). 

Many  persons,  both  Jews  and  Christians,  would  hold  that  no 
one  could  believe  the  first  possibility  (in  either  form)  and  yet 
legitimately  remain  a  Jew.  I  do  not  myself  believe  this  possibility 
— (I  think  the  vision  was  purely  '  subjective ') ;  but,  nevertheless, 
I  do  not  think  that  the  objective  vision  possibility  could  not  be 
held  by  a  Jew.  For  if  we  believe  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul, 
we  shall  also  believe  that  the  spirit  of  Jesus  survived  death,  and 
it  may  have  been  the  will  of  God  that  the  disciples  should  be 
miraculously  accorded  this  particular  vision.  So  it  may  have  been 
the  will  of  God  that  Mohammed  may  have  been  accorded  a  '  super- 
natural' vision.  When  I  think  of  the  gigantic  results  of  both 
Christianity  and  Mohammedanism,  it  seems  to  me,  in  some  moods 
and  for  some  reasons,  less  difficult  to  believe  that  they  are  based 
upon,  or  partly  built  up  from,  certain  special  divine  interventions 
than  that  they  are  based  upon  what  we  call '  illusions.' 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is,  for  other  reasons,  our  scientific 
duty  to  do  without  miracles  when  we  can.  If  all  other  miracles 
are  ill-founded,  it  is  probable  that  this  one  is  ill-founded  too. 

The  whole  building  up  of  the  resurrection  narratives  can  be 


XVI.]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MAEK  385 

adequately  accounted  for  on  the  subjective  vision  possibility ;  and 
again,  the  appearance  of  the  subjective  visions  to  the  disciples,  or 
to  some  of  them,  can  also  be  accounted  for  with  adequate  psycho- 
logical verisimilitude.  Not  only  has  the  objective  vision  hypothesis 
its  own  difficulties,  but  it  is  also  more  '  economical '  to  be  content 
with  the  subjective  vision  hypothesis,  if  it  can  be  adequately 
accounted  for  with  fair  and  reasonable  arguments. 

No  one  who  accepts  the  doctrine  of  'immortality'  will  hesitate 
for  one  moment  to  believe  in  the  'resurrection'  of  Jesus,  if  by 
resurrection  we  mean  that  his  life  did  not  terminate  upon  the 
cross.  If  others  '  live  again,'  then,  d  fortiori,  one  of  the  best  of 
men  so  lives.  But  to  the  Jew,  and  to  all  those  who  hold  the 
subjective  vision  hypothesis,  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  is  not 
the  proof  or  pledge  of  general  human  immortality ;  but,  on  the 
contrary,  the  belief  in  general  human  immortality  is  the  proof 
and  pledge  of  the  '  resurrection  of  Jesus.'  If  we  believe  already 
in  human  immortality,  it  does  not,  in  one  sense,  make  much 
difference  whether  we  accept  the  objective  or  the  subjective  vision 
hypothesis :  Jesus,  in  either  case,  is  alive,  whether  the  disciples 
'  really '  saw  him  or  not.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  do  not  believe 
in  human  immortality,  we  shall  still  less  believe  in  the  objective 
vision  hypothesis.  Thus,  to  those  who  have  not  grown  up  in,  or 
who  have  not  retained,  the  old  Christian  theology,  the  '  resur- 
rection '  of  Jesus  has  no  central  importance.  Their  faith  does  not 
hinge  on  it ;  the  Gospel  narrative  can  neither  upset  their  faith 
nor  confirm  it. 

A  difficulty  to  my  own  mind  in  the  subjective  vision  hypo- 
thesis, as  set  forth  and  explained,  for  example,  by  Schmiedel  and 
Arnold  Meyer,  is  one  which,  to  many  minds,  will  not  seem  a 
difficulty  at  all.  It  is,  perhaps,  less  a  difficulty  than  a  sadness. 
It  is  the  same  difficulty  or  sadness  which  presents  itself  to  me 
when  Professor  Margoliouth,  in  the  plenitude  of  his  great  know- 
ledge, would  have  me  believe  that  Mohammed  was  largely  a 
conscious  impostor.  It  is  hard  to  be  content  that  great  religious 
results  should  have  had  not  quite  satisfactory  causes.  The  sub- 
jective vision  was,  in  one  sense,  an  'illusion.'  Yet  upon  this 
illusion  hinged  the  great  religious  result  which  we  call  Christianity. 
So,  too,  it  is  hard  to  be  content  that  any  dross  and  error  should  be 
mingled  with  the  pure  gold  of  the  prophets.  But  we  cannot  hope 
to  understand  the  means  which  God  allows  or  wills  (whichever 
word  may  be  preferred)  in  the  development  and  production  of 
human  righteousness  and  knowledge.  His  will  is  done.  Righteous- 
ness and  knowledge,  which  are  the  only  'proof  of  God,  exist  and 
increase.  We  must  not  stumble  because  we  cannot  understand  the 
means. 

M.  25 


386  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XVI.  i-8 

1-8.    The  Empty  Tomb 
(Gp.  Matt,  xxviii.  i-io;  Luke  xxiv.  i-ii) 

1  And  when  the  sabbath  was  over,  Mary  Magdalene,  and  Mary 
the  mother  of  James,  and  Salome,  bought  sweet  spices,  that  they 

2  might  go  and  anoint  him.  And  very  early  in  the  morning  of  the 
first  day  of  the  week,  they  came  unto  the  sepulchre,  at  the  rising 

3  of  the  sun.    And  they  said  among  themselves,  'Who  will  roll  away 

4  for  us  the  stone  from  the  door  of  the  sepulchre  ?'  And  when  they 
looked,  they  saw  that  the  stone  had  been  rolled  away :  for  it  waa 

5  very  great.  And  entering  into  the  sepulchre,  they  saw  a  young 
man  sitting  on  the  right  side,  clothed  in  a  long  white  garment; 

6  and  they  were  sore  afraid.  But  he  said  unto  them,  'Be  not 
afraid:  ye  seek  Jesus  the  crucified  Nazarene;  he  is  risen;  he  is 

7  not  here :  behold  the  place  where  they  laid  him.  But  go,  tell  his 
disciples  and  Peter  that  he  goeth  before  you  into  Galilee :  there 

8  shall  ye  see  him,  as  he  said  unto  you.'  And  they  went  out,  and 
fled  from  the  sepulchre;  for  they  trembled  and  were  amazed: 
and  they  said  nothing  to  any  one ;    for  they  were  afraid. 

1.  The  second  Mary  is  here  called  the  mother  or,  as  W. 
thinks,  the  daughter  of  James.  Cp.  the  statements  in  xv.  47  and 
XV.  40. 

They  make  the  necessary  purchases  late  on  Saturday  evening. 
That  the  women  determine  to  anoint  a  corpse  which  had  already 
been  entombed  two  days  and  wrapped  round  in  its  cere-cloths 
seems  very  strange.  W.  calls  it  a  '  bold  thought.'  It  seems  to 
me  more — it  seems  to  me  a  thought  which  is  not  likely  to  be 
historic.  In  any  case  the  women  could  hardly  have  thought  of 
anointing  the  corpse  unless  they  knew  that  the  entombment  had 
been  meant  to  be,  and  was,  of  a  temporary  character  only.  J.  Weiss 
says :  '  How  could  the  women  reckon  upon  the  stone  being  rolled 
away  ?  The  cause  assigned  for  their  visit  to  the  grave  is  very 
unlikely.' 

2.  They  arrive  very  early  on  Sunday  morning  at  the  grave. 
But  the  sun  has  risen. 

3.  They  have  no  idea  or  thought  that  Jesus  may  have  risen. 
On  the  contrary,  their  one  preoccupation  is  the  question  of  the 
heavy  stone  at  the  mouth  of  the  grave.  Who  will  roll  it  away 
for  them  ? 


XVI.  1-8]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  387 

4.  The  stone  has  been  already  rolled  away :  for  it  was  very 
big.  The  second  part  of  the  verse  seems  awkward.  That  the 
stone  was  very  big  does  not  prove  that  it  was  rolled  away.  The 
words  would  be  more  suitable  after  verse  3.  In  their  present 
place  they  can  only  be  regarded  as  a  loose  way  of  expressing  the 
implied  thought  that  the  rolling  away  of  the  stone  was  something 
very  portentous  and  remarkable.  (So  Klostermann.)  Who  had 
rolled  the  stone  away  ?  Is  it  implied  that  this  was  done  by  Jesus 
himself?  He  '  rises,'  rolls  away  the  stone,  and  disappears.  Or  has 
the  stone  been  rolled  away  by  invisible  divine  power  ?  '  In  any 
case,'  says  Loisy,  '  it  is  understood  that  the  stone  had  to  be  rolled 
away  in  order  that  Jesus  might  come  out.' 

5.  The  women,  finding  the  stone  removed  from  the  mouth, 
enter  into  the  vault.  Instead  of  seeing,  as  they  expect,  the  body 
of  Jesus,  they  see  an  angel.  The  angel  looks  like  a  young  man, 
but  his  white  (priestly)  garments,  as  well  as  the  mere  fact  of  his 
presence  in  that  strange  place,  reveal  his  angelhood.  {Gp.  2  Mace, 
iii.  26;  Revelations  vii.  9,  13.)  It  is  also  important  to  note  that 
one  good  MS.  has  merely  '  having  come  to  the  tomb  '  {i.e.  iXBovaao 
for  ela-eXdova-ai).  Is  this  original?  Prof  Lake  strongly  holds 
that  the  young  man  is  not  an  angel,  but  a  man.  The  narrative, 
in  its  essence,  is  historical. 

6.  The  angel's  words :  '  Ye  seek  Jesus,  the  crucified  Naza- 
rene,'  sound  a  little  strange.  Menzies  says  that  they  are  'in 
character.  Jesus  is  not  described  in  terms  a  believer  would  use, 
or  with  any  reference  to  his  Messiahship,  but  in  such  words 
as  might  be  used  to  identify  him  either  to  a  follower  or  an  un- 
believer.' 

The  angel  then  announces  the  fact  of  the  resurrection.  Jesus 
has  risen  in  his  own  very  body.  The  angel  shows  the  place  where 
the  body  had  been  put,  and  this  place  is  empty.  The  MS.  D 
reads :  '  He  is  risen,  he  is  not  here,  lo,  there  is  the  place  where 
they  laid  him.'  Is  this,  as  Lake  is  inclined  to  think,  the  original 
text  ?    See  below.     (Lake,  p.  69.) 

7.  Is  there  a  contradiction  here  with  xiv.  50  ?  W.  and  others 
think  there  is,  inasmuch  as  xiv.  50  supposes  that  the  disciples 
had  fled,  immediately  after  the  arrest,  to  Galilee  (except  Peter), 
whereas  this  verse  would  imply  that  they  are  still  near  or  in 
Jerusalem,  and  that  the  women  are  to  tell  them  to  proceed  at 
once  to  Galilee.  But  it  must  be  admitted  that  it  does  not  say 
in  xiv.  50  that  they  fled  at  once  to  Galilee.  When  exactly  they 
dispersed  to  their  homes,  whether  after  or  before  the  crucifixion, 
is  not  stated.     In  any  case  our  verse,  like  xiv.  28,  is  meant  to 

25—3 


388  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XVI.  i-8 

account  for  the  fact  that  the  first  appearance  of  the  risen  Jesus 
took  place  in  Galilee,  perhaps  also  to  account  for  the  flight  of  the 
apostles  and  to  justify  it.  Lake  suggests  that  the  true  explanation 
of  xvi.  7,  by  which  we  can  maintain  its  consistency  with  xiv.  50 
and  yet  explain  that  verse  as  implying  that  the  disciples  had 
already  scattered  to  Galilee,  is  that  the  meaning  of  'he  goes  before 
you  into  Galilee '  {cp.  xiv.  28)  is,  he  will  be  in  Galilee  before  you. 
Before  you  arrive  in  Galilee,  which  will  take  you  some  time,  Jesus 
will  already  be  there  (Lake,  p.  76). 

'  There  shall  ye  see  him ' ;  that  is,  the  disciples,  not  the 
women.  The  words  which  the  women  are  to  repeat  are  addressed 
direct  to  the  disciples. 

8.  It  is  highly  remarkable  that  the  women  are  expressly 
stated  to  have  disobeyed  the  angel's  order.  And  if  they  did  not 
obey  it,  how  did  it  become  known  ?  Did  they  go  with  the  disciples 
to  Galilee  and  tell  them  there,  either  before  or  after  the  visions  of 
the  risen  Jesus  had  occurred?  But  this  is  a  very  strained  ex- 
planation. And,  on  the  other  hand,  the  reason  for  the  women's 
silence  is  far  from  clear.  That  the  occurrence  at  the  tomb  filled 
them  with  awe  and  fear  is  reasonable  enough ;  but  that,  when  they 
joined  their  friends,  they  still  said  nothing  seems  most  peculiar. 
The  trembling  and  bewilderment  are  psychologically  inadequate. 
The  only  explanation  which  is  possible  seems  to  be  that  it  was 
known  that  the  disciples  were  unprepared  for  what  they  saw  in 
Galilee.  The  faith  in  the  risen  Messiah  owes  nothing  to  the  dis- 
covery of  the  empty  tomb.  No  story  of  the  empty  tomb  had 
reached  the  apostles  when  that  faith  was  born  within  them.  The 
empty  tomb  story  grew  up  afterwards.  Hence  it  had  to  be  ex- 
plained why  the  women  kept  silence;  this  is  done  as  well  as 
might  be.  When  the  story  of  the  empty  tomb  became  current 
and  accepted,  the  need  was  no  longer  felt  for  the  silence  of  the 
women.  Its  improbability,  on  the  contrary,  became  felt.  Hence 
the  change  in  Matthew  and  Luke. 

The  opening  word  of  the  verse  i^eXOova-ai '  is  not  represented 
in  the  Arabic  Diatessaron  and  in  some  MSS.  is  altered  to  aKov- 
aavTe<; '  (Lake,  p.  62). 

What  follows  after  verse  8  is  from  another  hand.  It  is  inter- 
polated and  late.  W.  thinks  that  Mark  always  ended  at  8.  It 
was  the  intended  end.  Nothing  is  wanting.  The  resurrection  is 
announced  and  proved.  Others  hold  that  the  end  has  been  lost, 
or  that  the  writer  was  suddenly  prevented  from  concluding  his 
work.  No  certainty  on  this  point  is  possible.  The  present  ending 
is  rather  abrupt  and  awkward.  To  end  a  sentence  with  yap 
seems  odd.     '  It  is  therefore  probable  that  the  sentence  originally 


XVI.  1-8]  THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  389 

ran  "  for  they  were  afraid  of  the  Jews "  or  some  such  phrase ' 
(Lake,  p.  72  init.). 

The  more  radical  critics  reject  the  story  of  the  empty  tomb  as 
entirely  unhistorical.  Attempts  have  been  made  to  retain  the 
story  and  get  rid  of  the  miraculous  elements.  Thus  it  has  been 
supposed  that  the  women  did  go  to  the  tomb  and  did  find  it 
empty,  but  that  the  reason  was  that  the  Jewish  authorities  had 
removed  the  body.  Or,  again,  it  is  conjectured  that  Joseph  had 
only  provisionally  put  the  body  in  his  own  vault,  and  had  had  it 
removed  to  another  resting-place  before  the  visit  of  the  women. 
Or,  again,  it  is  conjectured  that  Mary  Magdalene  alone  visited  the 
tomb  (so  John),  and  that  she  had  a  vision,  or  trance,  or  seizure 
there,  and  that  her  vision  may  have  grown  into  the  present  story. 
But,  as  Loisy  well  points  out,  the  story  is  all  of  a  piece.  The 
angel  is  not  added  later ;  he  cannot  be  removed  without  destroying 
the  whole.     In  fact,  all  the  above  conjectures  are  very  doubtful. 

For  the  entirely  legendary  character  of  the  story  it  is  argued 
that  Paul  knows  nothing  about  it.  Secondly,  that  if  the  story 
had  happened,  the  women  would  not  have  disobeyed  the  order 
of  the  angel.  Mark's  statement  that  the  women  said  nothing 
implies  that  the  story  of  the  empty  sepulchre  was  unknown  when 
the  disciples  had  the  visions  in  Galilee  of  the  risen  Jesus,  and 
that  it  is,  in  fact,  a  later  tradition.  How  the  story  arose  is  not 
quite  easy,  but  the  growth  of  legend  is  often  difficult  to  explain. 
If  Jesus  had  risen,  as  the  disciples  believed  after  the  visions  in 
Galilee,  then,  on  current  theories  of  the  resurrection,  the  tomb 
must  have  been  empty.  'Therefore  no  hesitation  was  felt  in 
declaring  that  (according  to  all  reasonable  conjecture)  the  women 
who  had  witnessed  Jesus's  death  had  wished  to  anoint  his  body, 
and  then  had  come  to  know  of  the  emptiness  of  the  grave.  In 
the  fact  that,  according  to  Mark  and  Matthew,  this  was  not  alleged 
regarding  the  male  disciples,  we  can  see  still  a  true  recollection 
that  those  disciples  were  by  that  time  no  longer  in  Jerusalem.' 
So  Schmiedel,  in  Encyclopcedia  Biblica.  The  defenders  of  tradition 
and  miracle  may  not  unreasonably  argue  that  this  is  rather  a  poor 
explanation.  But,  nevertheless,  the  story  itself,  and  the  supposition 
of  the  empty  sepulchre,  and  of  the  rolled-away  stone,  are  much 
more  difficult  still.  It  is  better  to  assume  that  the  body  of  Jesus 
remained  where  it  was  placed  without  disturbance  or  miracle. 

After  the  above  paragraph  was  written  Prof.  Lake's  book 
appeared.  His  view  is  rather  peculiar.  He  holds  that  there  is  no 
reason  to  believe  that  Paul  was  unacquainted  with  the  story  of  the 
empty  tomb.  (It  is  in  any  case  difiicult  to  prove  a  negative.)  More- 
over, he  thinks  that  the  story  in  Mark  in  its  essentials  is  accurate 
and  historic.    The  women  go  to  what  they  think  is  the  tomb :  they 


390  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS  [XVI.  i-8 

find  it  open.  '  A  young  man  who  was  in  the  entrance,  guessing 
their  errand,  tried  to  tell  them  that  they  had  made  a  mistake  in 
the  place.  "  He  is  not  here,"  said  he ;  "  see  the  place  where  they 
laid  him,"  and  probably  pointed  to  the  next  tomb.'  But  the 
women  were  frightened  at  the  detection  of  their  errand  and  fled. 
They  heard  very  imperfectly,  or  not  at  all.  Later  on  when  they 
were  rejoined  by  the  men  who  had  experienced  the  visions  (or 
when,  as  I  should  put  it,  they  rejoined  the  men  in  Galilee),  they 
remembered  the  incident  at  the  tomb.  But  if  Jesus  was  risen, 
then  the  tomb  was  empty;  so  .t]i.ey_.cjama_tobeliey^-that  the 
young  mari  waa_aB-aBgelr  and  that  what  he  bad,  told  them  was 
that  Jesus  had  risen_and_thatJLeJiBd_given_the^^  for 

the -disciples  (Lake,  pp.  246-253,  193,  199).  It  does  not  seem  to 
me  likely  that  this  explanation,  or  '  suggestion,'  as  Lake  calls  it, 
will  permanently  hold  the  field.  Its  ingenuity,  however,  is  most 
undeniable. 


9-20.    Latek  Version  of  the  Resurrection 

9  [Now  after  he  had  risen,  early  on  the  first  day  of  the  week,  he 
appeared  first  to  Mary  Magdalene,  out  of  whom  he  had  cast  sevea 

10  devils.    And  she  went  and  told  them  that  had  been  with  him,  as 

1 1  they  mourned  and  wept.     And  they,  when  they  heard  that  he  was 

12  alive,  and  had  been  seen  by  her,  believed  it  not.  After  that  he 
appeared  in  another  form  unto  two  of  them,  as  they  were  walking 

13  and  going  into  the  country.  And  they  went  and  told  it  unto  the 
others,  but  they  did  not  believe  even  them. 

14  Afterward  he  appeared  unto  the  eleven  as  they  sat  at  table, 
and  upbraided  them  with  their  unbelief  and  hardness  of  heart, 

15  because  they  believed  not  them  who  had  seen  him  risen.  And  he 
said  unto  them, '  Go  ye  throughout  all  the  world,  and  preach  the 

16  gospel  to  every  creature.     He  that  believeth  and  is  baptized  shall 

17  be  saved ;  but  he  that  believeth  not  shall  be  condemned.  And 
these  signs  shall  follow  them  that  believe :  In  my  name  shall  they 

18  cast  out  demons ;  they  shall  speak  with  new  tongues ;  they  shall 
take  up  serpents ;  and  if  they  drink  any  deadly  thing,  it  shall 
not  hurt  them ;  they  shall  lay  hands  on  the  sick,  and  they  shall 
recover.' 

1 9  Now  after  the  Lord  had  spoken  unto  them,  he  was  taken  up 

20  into  heaven,  and  sat  down  on  the  right  hand  of  God.     But  they 


XVI.  9-20]        THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK  391 

went  forth,  and  preached  everywhere,  the  Lord  helping  them  and 
confirming  the  Word  through  the  signs  which  followed  it.J 

The  Gospel  of  Mark  ends  with  xvi.  8.  Whether  the  true  end 
has  been  lost,  or  whether  xvi.  8  was  the  intentional — though,  to 
us,  oddly  abrupt — end,  is  disputed  among  scholars.  But  the 
passage  which  now  follows  (9-20)  is  certainly  unauthentic.  It 
is  wanting  in  some  of  the  best  MSS.  It  is  wanting  in  the  S.S. 
It  is  a  compilation  unlike  Mark  in  style  and  vocabulary.  It 
contradicts  implicitly,  if  not  explicitly,  what  Mark  had  said  as 
to  the  scene  of  the  apparitions  being  Galilee.  It  presupposes 
Matthew  and  Luke  and  John.  It  has  allusions  to  them  all,  and 
also  to  Acts. 

9-1 1.  This  '  appearance '  depends  on  John  xx.,  but  has  a  few 
touches  from  Luke  xxiv. 

12,  13.     This  depends  on  Luke  xxiv.  (the  Emmaus  story). 

14.  The  final  'appearance,'  which  depends  partly  on  Luke 
xxiv.  41-43  and  partly  on  passages  in  Acts.  The  words  which 
Jesus  speaks  contain  many  echoes.  Thus  1 5  depends  on  Matthew 
xxviii.  19. 

16.  Gp.  Acts  xvi.  31 ;  John  iii.  18. 

17.  The  signs  refer  to  Acts  ii.,  or  to  the  '  tongues'  of  Paul  in 
I  Cor.  xii.,  xiv. 

18.  The  snake-lifting  is  curious.  Some  see  an  allusion  to 
Acts  xxviii.  3-5.  Perhaps  it  is  only  another  way  of  putting  Luke 
X.  19. 

19.  The  description  of  the  ascension  is  suggested  by  some 
verses  in  Acts.     (Op.  Acts  i.  8-1 1,  ii.  33.) 

'  The  resurrection  of  Jesus  is  a  Christian  belief,  not  a  fact  of 
Gospel  history.  And  if  one  were  compelled  to  regard  it  as  a 
historic  fact,  one  would  be  obliged  to  admit  that  this  fact  is  not 
guaranteed  by  evidence  which  is  adequately  sure,  consistent,  clear 
and  precise '  {E.  S.  11.  p.  798).  With  these  words  Loisy  ends  his 
great  commentary. 


392  THE  SYNOPTIC  GOSPELS 


Extra  Note  on  Mark  xii.  i-ii 

Prof.  Burkitt,  always  keen  to  champion  the  genuineness  of  whatever 
Mark  says  about,  or  ascribes  to,  Jesus,  and  specially  anxious  to  disprove 
the  theory  of  Mark's  Paulinism,  essays  to  show  that  the  parable  of  the 
wicked  husbandmen  is  authentic,  'a  genuine  historical  reminiscence'  of 
words  which  Jesus  actually  spoke  on  this  particular  occasion.  One  of  his 
chief  arguments  is  that,  if  it  were  the  '  product  of  later  Christian  reflection,' 
it  would  contain  a  reference  to  the  resurrection.  For  my  part  I  think  Loisy's 
elaborate  analysis  of  the  parable  and  his  conclusions,  already  referred  to  in 
the  notes,  are  more  convincing  than  Prof.  Burkitt's  most  ingenious  pleadings. 
As  to  the  absence  of  any  reference  to  the  resurrection,  see  note  on  verses 
lo,  II.  Prof.  Burkitt  thinks  that  the  forecast  of  the  parable  was  not  fulfilled. 
For  after  70  a.d.  the  vineyard  in  the  hteral  sense  was  not  given  to  anybody 
else  at  all ;  it  was  desolate.  But  one  need  not  suppose  that  the  parable,  even  if 
later  than  Jesus,  was  written  after  70.  What  it  does  suggest  is  that  the 
position  of  vantage  relative  to  God  held  before  by  the  Jews  is  now  to  be  held 
by  '  others,'  i.e.  by  Christians.  -> 

Prof  Burkitt  strongly  holds  the  view  that  Jesus  not  only  foresaw  his 
death,  but  regarded  it  as  the  divinely  appointed  means  for  hastening  on  the 
Day  of  Judgment,  and  thus  for  bringing  in  the  Kingdom.  Hence  he  presses 
the  authenticity  of  the  conversation  appended  to  the  transfiguration,  in  spite 
of  its  suspicious  environment.  '  For  even  in  the  transfiguration,'  says  this 
doughty  champion  of  Mark, '  we  have  practically  a  narrative  of  what  St  Peter 
thought  he  remembered  having  seen,'  while  Mark  ix.  9-13  is  'a  piece  of  true 
historical  reminiscence.'  Just  as  the  herald  had  to  suflFer  and  die,  so  too  does 
Jesus  discern  that  he,  the  Messiah,  must  suffer  and  die  likewise.  In  John's 
fate  he  reads  his  own,  '  even  though  no  Scripture  seemed  to  indicate  it.'  So 
too  with  Mark  x.  45.  There  is  no  Paulinism  here.  All  that  the  verse  says 
is  that  the  death  of  Jesus  will  bring  ransom  and  redemption  to  many — to 
the  true  Israel.  The  wicked  husbandmen  will  be  slain,  the  sinners  will 
perish,  'but  the  true  Israel  will  be  delivered  from  their  enemies  and  Grod 
wiU  reign  over  them.  He  will  come  and  visit  his  vineyard.'  Just  so  does 
Jesus  say  in  xiv.  24,  that  his  blood  will  be  poured  out '  for  many ' — to  the 
advantage  of  many.  And  this  result  of  his  death  was  to  happen  very  soon. 
I  do  not  think  that  this  interpretation  does  justice  to  the  language  of  x.  45. 
But  I  agree  with  Prof.  Burkitt  that  'after  the  event  it  was  easy  enough 
to  pick  out  Isaiah  liii.  and  give  it  a  Christian  interpretation,  but  there  is 
nothing  to  show  that  this  was  ever  done  by  anyone  before  the  Passion  in 
Jerusalem.  The  one  reference  to  Isaiah  liii.  in  the  recorded  words  of  Jesus 
is  the  more  or  less  ironical  warning  to  the  disciples  on  the  last  night  that 
soon  their  Master  would  be  reckoned  among  lawless  folk  (Luke  xxiii.  37 ; 
cp.  Isaiah  liii.  12).  The  identification,  the  synthesis,  of  the  Messiah  and  the 
Suffering  Servant,  is  the  result  of  the  Crucifixion,  not  an  anticipation  of  it ' 
(Burkitt,  '  Parable  of  the  Wicked  Husbandmen,'  in  Transactions  of  the  Third 
International  Congress  for  the  History  of  Religion,  Vol.  II.  pp.  321-328). 


CAMBRIDGE:    PRINTED   BY  JOHN  CLAY,    M.A.    AT  THE   UNIVERSITY   PRESS.